Punishment
by Maximilliam
Summary: She too, will confess and then...she too will die. Eventualy CS. Angs story. ON HIATUS
1. Prologue

_Prologue_

- Tell me about you?

- Fuck you.

That was her answer. She wasn't going to give him the pleasure of a little talk, much less about her.

- I want to know you…to know about your life, about your dreams, about your surroundings…

- My surroundings? Ha! Is it something you don't see? I'm trapped mother fucker! Untie me, and let me explain you how I'm going to kick your ass!

She screamed to him trying to escape from bonds that kept her prisoner. The strings were leaving red marks around her wrists and ankles, and the pressure was hurting her.

She watched him, but couldn't see far below the shadows, only a silhouette of his body and a twinkle red light of a video-camera or that it seemed. The bright light of a spotlight was burning her pupils, plus the sweat running through her front make her difficult maintain open her eyes.

Yes, she was perfect. She was brave even in these moments of terror. He only needed to know one thing and her brave heart will be broken into pieces and the terror will start. Only one thing, but to manage to do it, he need her to say it. Yes those brown eyes will be screaming in terror, pain, and suffer. But he needed to be patience, and let the time and the water do its work.

- If you don't answer my questions, it's going to be worse. So do us a favour and start to talk, please.

She was thinking. Thinking about a million of things at the time. Her skull was hurting, her wrists and ankles too. The light was very hot, and the fear, was making her sweat. She didn't know where she was, even less who her captor was. She wanted to be at home, with her lover, _"What do you want from me?"_ She though.

- Oh you know deep in your heart what I want. Don't make me get to it.

It was so obvious what she was thinking? But what was it? She didn't know anything about him, and didn't kwon what he wanted…How is she going to survive, if she didn't know the answer.

- Maybe I could bring you some light to you. Do you want me to do that?

- Please, enlighten me.

- Ok.

A shocked pain runs through her body. Her muscles tensed up, her teeth press together, trying desperately to suppress a cry of pain, but she couldn't cry. The electricity kept her from that. All of a sudden, like it began, it was gone. Her mouth was dry. Her muscles where hurting her, because of the shock and the electricity. At this moment she, realised that the chair that kept her sited was and electric chair, the kind on which convicts where executed...

TBC


	2. 10 54d Possible Dead Body

**AN:** Thanks for all the reviews. I known this is a powerful start but don't be mad at me, please. All have a reason. So, please, do me a favour and be patience. This will take a while.

Special thanks to SoFrost for been my beta's in this story. Without your suggestions and corrections this can't be possible.

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**_Chapter 1 - 10-54d (Possible dead body)_**

_Three months ago_

"Dispatch we received a 10-54d in an abandoned warehouse near Lin Avenue with Ana Road. Jackson and I are going to break in" Officer Keener informed to the radio in his shoulder.

This call wasn't the first for him, but for Jackson, his new partner it was. He look to Jackson. He was a rookie cop, fresh from the academy. His appearance was stoic, but Keener could tell that his partner was nothing but nervous. He needed to be the one who took in charge of the situation.

Gun in hand, he make a signal to his partner with a nod of the head. They were ready to enter the dark structure. Slowly, they came in through the door flashing with the light any type of boxes piled up on the left. When they were in, both policemen did the same grimace when the smell of chemicals and blood met them. This was going to be bad.

Keener stared his partner. Jackson was trembling, his gun was shaking. Keener could see how Jackson was trying to make an effort to control it, but failed miserably.

"Las Vegas PD! Is anyone here?" Called Keener. His voice resounded in the walls, echoing his calling. _Nobody's home _he thought to himself. His flashlight illuminated the right side of the warehouse, there were only naked walls. _Nothing to the right, nothing to the left. Let's go to the middle_

Jackson approached to the centre of the warehouse.

"This seems to be empty. I don't think we could find any…."

He stopped dead in his tracks. Something cough his attention. A pond of blood. Keener sensing there wasn't something right, go near him.

"What? Did you find something?" He was looking to his rookie, whom face had an ashen shade, the gun pointing to the floor, and his eyes looking up in terror.

Keener, follow his gaze from the pool of blood up to the macabre scene. Two meters above them a body of a male was suspended from the roof. It was like a crucifixion. The arms of the body with outstretched arms were bleeding and there cut in form of "T" in both arms. His legs were plenty of cuts and burns. That was the first thing that caught the officer's eyes. Time seemed to stop, and the blood drops were falling in slow motion to the red pool.

"My God…."

"Is …he… alive?" Asked Jackson, suppressing a retching.

"I don't think so" Keener whispered to his partner still looking above his head.

"I think I'm going to be sick…" Jackson said raising his hand to her mouth.

"Go, go, go! Outside! I don't want to hear anything from CSI why there's your vomit in here" He ordered to the poor boy who was now running to the exterior to puke.

Meanwhile Jackson was throwing up Keener called the station.

"Dispatch, this is 307, reporting a DB, send a Coroner and CSI"

With that he stayed looking up to the body. He could notice that the body was dressed in underwear, blue boxers or what it rest of the colour and a white undershirt, that it had turned red because of the blood. There was something hanging up from the neck of the victim. With his flashlight he tried to focus on the object. There was no doubt to him, it was an old VHS tape. He tried to concentrated his eyes on the letters, but only could see the capital letters LVPD.

TBC


	3. No evidence, just a videotape

**_Chapter 2 – No evidence, just a videotape _**

The warehouse was a dark small and a dilapidated building. There were two cars parked. One was a police car, from the officers who attended the call. The other one was Brass' unmarked car who was leaning against the door waiting for them.

Sara, usually the first to arrive, did not make an exception, that day. She didn't understood what took the others so much time to drive to a crime scene, much less when Warrick and Catherine were native from Las Vegas.

David's coroner van was missing too, allegedly held up in the traffic that had hindered Warrick and Catherine's arrive.

Brass was examining something in his shoe, when he glanced up as Sara's Tahoe came to a halt and she jumped out sliding her sunglasses over her eyes as she approached him.

"Hey Sara" He called amiably, straightening from his vehicle. "Where are the others?" "I hope your not working solo again, because you are gonna need some help in there" He said pointing to the building.

She shrugged her shoulders as an answer, flashing him a brief smile in greeting. "Who knows? It was a quick journey, but you know how they are, maybe the traffic…"

She was interrupted by the arriving of another vehicle, which was Warrick's Tahoe. He stopped the engine meanwhile Catherine was opening the passenger door and heading to the back of the vehicle to take their kits.

"Right on time, don't you think?" Brass said nodding to the new arrived CSIs.

"Dammit girl, how did you manage? You were the last one to head up here!" Warrick said shaking his head.

"Hey, what happened to you? You are so late!"

"We are late?!" Warrick and Catherine's reply both at the same time in disbelieve.

"Ok, guys, let's go to work, ok?" Brass said to the CSIs

"Ok, what have we got?" Said Catherine taking charge of the situation.

Brass nodded to the dilapidated building, where the two arriving officers emerged, features distinctly ashen. One retreated hastily to one side, the unmistakable sounds of him throwing up immediately reaching their ears.

The three CSI looked back at Brass expecting his explanation.

"Got a call from an anonymous at 04:50 pm saying there was a dead body in there" He said pointing the warehouse. "Officers Keener and Jackson arrive at the scene at 05:04pm and examined the building. What they found you will see"

"Ok. Well, let's go check it out" Catherine said heading to the warehouse

"I need to warn you" Brass said looking especially to Sara and Catherine "It's pretty messy in there"

Sara and Catherine nodded, letting him know they could handle it, even as their minds anticipate his grim warning.

"Sara take the perimeter, Warrick and I are going to see what creepy thing we can found in there. Join us when you'll finish"

A sigh of frustration escaped from Sara's lips. _With her…always the perimeter…I can't believe this…Does she think I can't handle what we find or is it just to piss me off? _She was looking to Catherine intensely showing her discomfort.

"Is there any problem?"

"Nope, no problem at all" She wasn't to pick up a fight over something like this. So she went to make the perimeter.

Meanwhile, Warrick and Catherine entered the building, turning on their flashlights.

What they saw took their breaths away. Warrick studied the area with clinical eye, while Catherine couldn't apart her eyes from the body.

"Ok, let's check first the warehouse; see if we can find something to nail that bastard" she sighed "What do you want, left or right?"

"Left" said Warrick in a serious tone. "This would give some time to David to arrive. I heard him said he was trapped in traffic"

"Yeah. He could give us a hand to bring him down".

After a moment of silence and without any evidence found, they reach the body. They were considering how to pull down the body, Warrick looked at Catherine seriously. He didn't' know how to approach the 'Sara' topic doing the perimeter, so he took the direct way.

Sensing there was something, Catherine, directed her attention to Warrick. After a moment she asked "What?"

"You know, you pissed off Sara, telling her to do the perimeter"

"Someone needs to do it, and I tell you something…Brass was right about this crime scene, I don't know if she is prepared after Cammie's death" She said with a little concerned in her voice.

"I appreciate your concern Catherine, but I'm fine" None of them had sensed Sara approaching to them. She wasn't looking at them but at the body

"Sara…" Started to say Catherine but was interrupted by Sara's question

"The perimeter is as clean as we can expect from a place like this" Looking up to the body she said "How are we going to pull him down? I don't see anything to climb up there." She said indifferently to Catherine and Warrick.

Warrick sensed the discomfort in Sara about Catherine's concern and that she didn't want to talk about it as she studied the body. Suddenly and idea came up to him.

"The body is tied up to the beam with a single loop. There's an empty pulley up there"

Sara directed her torch to the pulley. "We could lower him down with that"

"Maybe that's how the killer pulled him up" Catherine said looking around searching for a stair or something to help them.

"First things first" Sara said seriously. "First we need to pull him down" That wasn't passed by Catherine who directed her a wild look.

At this right moment David make his appearance with a worry expression.

"Sorry guys, but the traffic…:" He said to apologize. Sensing the tensed situation, between the two women, he directed a look to Warrick who shrugged his shoulders.

"We need your help David!"

After the body was disposed on the floor Sara started to inspect the body, while David was taking the liver temperature. She noticed the videotape on the neck of the victim. "This is addressed to LVPD. The killer wants us to watch it" After a pause, she added "Archie will be gratefult to process something after all" Taking an evidence bag she deposited there and marked with her initials.

"He is only wearing his underwear, and by the smell I think he was very wet…." Warrick said examining the clothes of the victim.

"Liver temperature indicates that he's been for about 4 hours. At first sight, seems like he killed himself" He said pointing to the two "T" in his arms.

"And how do you explain he ended up there?" Catherine remarked with a smile on her lips.

David looked up to Catherine thinking about it, but dismissed any further answer because she was right. "This isn't only a suicide. It's a murder with its entire letters." Added Catherine looking to the eye of the young coroner

"Talking about letters, guys, you need to see this" Warrick said pointing to the chest of the dead body, while Sara was taking photographs.

"The blood trespassed the undershirt" With a sigh, Catherine directed to her partners. "I think we are going to see what was written when Dr. Robbins do the autopsy. It will easier to process his clothes and him there than here at a crime scene "

After a while of processing the body and the two planks that kept him like Jesus Christ, and wrapping all possible evidence, the team was heading to Lab to process.

"Ok, I'm…I'm going to take the body with me if it's all right with all of you"

"It's ok David, we have all we need" Catherine said to the young coroner.

"I'm going to take this videotape to Archie to see what the killer left us. Right now I think that it's the only thing we can examine properly" with that Sara headed to her Tahoe without another word to her companions.

Catherine and Warrick contemplated her leaving in a tensed silence. Once she was out of sight Warrick spoke to Catherine. "You really pissed her off…"

TBC


	4. Autopsy of a body

**AN: **Thank you for all the reviews guys. It encourages me to keep writing.

**CaptainK8**: I know you have a lot of questions, but be patience because all have an answer

**Chelsee6**: Yes! It's a drama. Let the story tell you what kind of drama is.

**Pole:** You're my fan number one! Thank you for your review. I don't consider myself excellent with descriptions but it's like a film playing in my head, and what a camera saw I saw it.

Thak you all for your support specially to SoFrost who's been my beta since this story started.

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**_Chapter_****_ 3 –_****_ Autopsy of a body_**

Dr. Al Robbins was one of the best coroners in all the state of Nevada. He was meticulous and took good care of all the bodies that come to his autopsy room. In all his years as a coroner, never cease to amazed him what a human being could done to another . There was a Latin proverb that described perfectly the human kind to him: "Homo homini lupus" – the man is a wolf for the man.

A wild wolf was the type of animal who inflicted all the pain to the man lying on his autopsy table. To him all the bodies were the same. Human corpses that born, grew up and died, and in the middle of all of these was a plenty life, already good or bad, but a life once. But no one never, never, deserved to suffer all the pain that man had suffered.

"Caucasian male between 30 and 35 years old" with those words he started the autopsy to the man stretched down on the table.

Meanwhile Dr. Robbins practiced the autopsy to the dead body, Catherine was examining the clothes searching for any clue that brought the perpretor to justice. The undershirt was covered in blood supposedly from the victim. She took some samples to give it to Wendy. She didn't expect found anything else, but she needed to be thorough. She searched every fiber of the cloth, without success.

After an hour of not finding anything but blood, she went to see Sara and see if she had more luck with the videotape. She was sure this case was going to affect the brunette, but she didn't know how to show her concern to Sara, about the case and how it would affect her.

She found her in the A/V Lab, waiting for Archie. She studied her and saw what seemed like a little concern on the woman's face. She was deep in thought. In fact Sara, was measuring if she was prepared to watch the videotape or not. After seeing the body she wasn't sure. She didn't need to go to Dr. Robbins to know that the victim had suffered and her instincts were telling her that whatever it was on that video it wasn't beautiful or peaceful. She knew deep in her heart that the killer wasn't compassionate.

"Sara, are you all right?" Catherine interrupted Sara's thoughts entering in the room.

"Yeah" She said still absent. Catherine waited for Sara to add something else. A couple of seconds, passed, and neither of the two women moved, both of them watching with a certain tremor and distance the videotape.

After a while, Catherine, addressed to Sara, breaking the contact eye with the videotape. "I'm going to see Doc Robbins, wanna come?"

There was a pause, until Sara looked to Catherine with determination and added. "I think I'm gonna watch the videotape."

"Are you sure? I mean, you could wait until we have Robbins' report. It will be easier to watch it…you know…just in case…you know".

"Someone has to process this" She said a little on the defensive. "We can't lose more time, and I don't think Robbins' report will contribute to give us anything else that we didn't see, except for internal traumas. It wouldn't help".

"Ok" was Catherine replied a little surprised by the young woman's reply. Sara was determinate to see the video at all cost. "I'll be at the morgue"

With that, Catherine left the brunette alone in the A/V Lab, hoping it didn't take long to Archie to arrive, because she didn't like the idea of Sara watching alone what was possibly a snuff movie. She neither wanted to know what was in there, it was scary but at the same time there was curiosity and needed to know.

She arrived at the coroner's office and entered. She saw Dr. Robbing near the body taking a few notes.

"Hey Doc. How it went?"

"Catherine" Dr. Robbins said with a nod . "I heard from David how you found him. This wasn't a good sight, I suppose". He said arching an eyebrow.

"Not the best" She said with a sigh. "What did you find?"

"A lot of thing, but first I would like to show you something" He said cryptically heading to the autopsy table where the body was covered with a sheet till his torso. Doc. Robbins retired the sheet till the waist of the corpse. There was something written in the victim's chest.

"What the hell?!" Catherine exclaimed. "Our bodies are prisons for our souls...". The cuts that formed the words where deep enough to let her read the message without difficult. Geometrical red lines that form an epitaph "This was stabbed in his chest?"

"Yes, there are multiple lacerations in his legs too. His extremities were broken, toes and hands, what makes it difficult for him to cut his arms."

"Discard suicide. I could tell you by the way we found the body" The rage was evident in her voice even she attempted to hide it "What else?"

"The wounds in the chest were made pre-mortem. I don't know how the killer managed to keep him quiet, but maybe he was tied up or induced to take a drug. I send a blood sample to tox to be sure. There are marks of ligatures on what's left of his wrists. Also he was strangled and beated, repeatedly." He said pointing the marks on the cheeks and around the torso. With a serious tone he added "this man was tortured."

"Cause of death?" asked the blonde looking at the doctor's eyes.

"He bled out to death produced by the laceration of the cephalic and basilic veins in his wrists and arms. The cuts are deep and clean. I dare to say, it was made with a sharpe knife" he announced

"This man was beaten, cut and bleed out to death and didn't oppose any resistance?!" Catherine pointed out surprise

"I didn't found any indication of struggle, only the marks in his wrist indicate some resistance. It's possible it was drugged, but like I said we need to wait to the tox report"

"Thanks Doc." With that she was going to exit the room when a question came to her. "How many days was he tortured?" The tremor was evident in her voice, like she didn't want to know the real answer. But Dr. Robbins only had one answer.

_Please, tell me it was a few hours, please…_ she mentally hoped. 

"Maybe 3 days" Catherine's reaction was stupor. She couldn't believe that this man had endured 3 days of constant torturing. Seeing the reaction in Catherine's face he added. "It's surprising what the human body can really endure, but even that..."

She was tensed, she didn't want it to be that long, even less after what Al told her. She didn't want either Sara to watch the videotape alone, because now she knew what would be on it, and only thinking about it turn her stomach upside down.

TBC


	5. Watching

**AN:**Thanks for your reviews. Remeber that reviews are the way to tell me if you are enjoing the story, so please keep posting your thoughts about it.

Again, thaks to SoFrost for all the work you'd done. I don't know what I'll do without your corrections.

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**_Chapter 4 – Watching_**

At the A/V Lab, Sara was still with her thoughts. The body was a mess and by her experience she knew that it was beaten and cut. She didn't need to know much more. Maybe Catherine was right and she needed to wait until her return or Archie's to see the videotape. Half an hour ago she was scanning the tape with the ALS but got nothing. No prints and nothing in the duct tape that surrounded the neck of the victim. It was a usual duct tape, so tracking where it was bought it was useless.

After Catherine's departure, she was still watching the tape from a certain distance. Thinking about what it would be in there. She had a strange feeling in her backbone. She told Catherine she'll watch the tape, but now, ten minutes after, she was still in the same position, seated with her arms crossed in her chest and eyes fixed in the among of plastic that lay on the table. But the look in her eyes had changed. Now there wasn't fear or indecision, they were full of determination. She needed to let the past behind her. She needed to forget about Cammie's death. It wasn't the first time she saw someone die, but the second. It always made you feel the same: useless, and she hated been useless. When Nick was abducted, she felt impotent until they found him alive. With Cammie's death the feeling was still there.

_Get a grip, Sidle! You need to see what happened and maybe you could give some closure._ She thought to herself.

With that thought she stood up, took the tape and put in the video player. She pressed play and waited for the screen turned in an intense game of colors from white to black passing by the yellow, cyan, green, purple, red and electric blue, the test colors. An intense and constant whistle was the sound that received. Thirty seconds passed and the image turned black. There was no sound now, only the static of the videotape. After another five seconds the blackness disappeared giving the image of a beated and bloody man. The camera was focus on the middle section of the man showing his chest and the head. He was the victim they found hanging up from a beam at the warehouse.

His eyes were half closed, and his breathing irregular. His lips were complete cracked and his tongue was trying to produce some saliva. He was looking at the camera, eyes fixed in the lent. He was trembling and sweating. Sara couldn't tell if it was because he was cold or because he was in fear.

"My… my name is Carl…. Roth … and they're …going to … kill me" The man begun in a husky voice. He begun to sob, at this Sara frowned her browns. That name was familiar to her, but couldn't put it in place.

"Please…why are you doing …this …to me?" He continued sobbing. The tears were falling, running by his face. "It was a long time ago; I didn't mean to happen…I don't deserve to die…" He was begging to the person or persons on the other side of the camera. His face was contorted in implore.

There was another voice in the tape, but she couldn't heard what was saying. Carl seemed to compose himself, but not entirely. His trembles were constant and the tears in his face didn't disappear. He took air and continued.

"Four years ago I raped a woman….but I pay my debt!" He screamed to the person or persons behind the camera. His sobs increased. There was again the other voice but the sound was very low to know what was saying to him. _Maybe Archie could extract the other voice_ Sara thought to herself. The sentiment that started to came up to the surface of Sara's feeling was another one. It wasn't compassionate, neither pity, it was rage and anger; anger because this man raped a woman four years ago and he was out of jail. She gritted her teeth, to suppress the agony and the rage that she was feeling.

"After I was released from jail….I went to her… for revenge, and I raped again." This was said with resentment. "I told her to not go to the police, and she didn't go". He told with a sardonic smile. He was no longer begging for his life. He was remembering and that gave him force to endure what was going to happen to him. There was wickedness in his eyes, Sara could tell, and no regret.

This was received by an electric shock. The man began to scream in pain. His mouth was full open, eyes pressed together with force. It was his punishment for showing no regret. After like it seemed an eternity, the shock subsided. The breaths of the man were painful, and laborious.

Again the second voice talk. This time she could heard what was saying _"Tell them what happened next!"_ It was an order, and Carl took it like that, answering quickly.

"She killed herself cutting her veins"

_Bastard, mother fucker_ These were Sara's thoughts. _No way you deserved what you got_.

The frame open up, reveling Carl tied up to the two tables crossed. He was in vertical position. Another figure dressed completely in black approached him with a knife in the right hand.

"Don't be near to me! Stay away from me!" Carl screamed to the other person. By the complexion Sara could tell it was a man. The man positioned in front of Carl, and raised his undershirt to retired the cables that made the electricity run across Carl's body. He brought the knife to the chest of the man and started to slide it around his chest, beginning for the left and continuing by the right. The screams of the man was all that the camera captured. His head was shaking from one side to another. The blood started to slid by his chest and legs. After a full two minutes of agony, the masked man, positioned in one side of Carl. He slided with force the knife by Carl's right wrist and arm. After that he surrounded the cross and went for the other arm, doing the same. After that he retired and go out of sight. Blood was everywhere. The screams of Carl were the only thing that Sara could heard, screams full of pain, but were decreasing as he was loosing blood. After what would be four minutes, there was only silence and the image turned black again.

Sara stared at the screen, in the same position. Her face was a mask, but her eyes speak volumes. They were shining with anger. She had lost perspective once again. She had lost it when she was hand-in-hand with the murderer of Cammie's and the other 5 showgirls, thinking he was another victim, and she had lost perspective again thinking that Carl's body was another victim.

"You need to focus Sara"

The voice startled her. She directed a look of surprise to the door of the A/V Lab to see Catherine learning in the doorframe. Obviously she saw the videotape from the beginning but didn't say anything.

"How long have you been there?" She asked directing another look at the screen and pressing the stop button.

"Enough time to see you thinking he deserved it." Added the blonde approaching to the slim brunette.

"And you don't think the same, right?" Sara asked bitterly.

Catherine contemplated the brunette a few seconds, after those she responded "We are here because there was a homicide, not to judge the victims or the perpretors. Whoever did this" she said pointing the screen "deserve the same punishment, but first it has to pass for the system penalty. We aren't judges, Sara, we are here only to take, process and present evidence to a jury"

"You sound like Grissom" The other one responded coldly. This wasn't passed by Catherine. The tone left a lot to desire.

"If you have a problem with this case, I can ask Grissom to take Nick or Greg to do your job" replied Catherine confronting the brunette, crossing her arms over her chest.

Sara considered a few seconds, challenging the blonde with her eyes. "I do not have a problem, Catherine" She said implying more aspects. She didn't have a problem with the case. She could focus on the evidence and do the job. Both women know it, but the warning was there.

"Then focus on the evidence and keep your thought to yourself".

At this moment Archie arrived to the A/V Lab with a mug of coffee in his hand and saw the two women.

"Hello ladies" He said in a comic tone, which was dismissed quickly seeing how the women look at each other.

"Archie, good to see you" Catherine greeted him in a sharp tone. "I need you to process a videotape. Sara will inform you about the case. I want the results as soon as possible. If anyone needs me I'll be in my office" With those words, Catherine left the two alone and headed to her office.

"Did I miss something?" He asked to Sara who was watching with irritation Catherine departure.

"Let's process this, ok?" She said pointing the video. It was obvious to Archie that he wasn't going to get anything from Sara about the previous confrontation.

_This case it's going to be a hell_ Sara thought to herself.


	6. More information

**AN: Chelsee6** I know that my grammar is awful and sometimes it's a little hard to understan a sentence. I'm spanish and this is my first attempt in english, so please be patience with me because it's hard to write in a language you don't completely dominate.

**Pole** Thanks for your review, you really encourage me.

Thanks a lot for your reviews and keep posting because that's the way for me, to know if you are enjoying or not the story.

Special thanks as always to SoFrost for the corrections and suggestions.

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**_Chapter 5 – More Information _**

Brass was inspecting all the labs in search of Catherine, Warrick or Sara. He found the second one in the Layer Room scanning meticulously a 2x 0.5x0.5 plank with a magnifying glass. He seemed frustrated. He searched all the wood in order to find some prints but got nothing, and the same was happening now. No fibers, no nothing.

"Fuck!" He said punching the table with his fist. It was his way to express how exasperated he was. He couldn't believe that. It was frustrating.

"Hey Big boy!!" Barss said to him entering in the room "Take it easy"

"I've got two hours of nothing, man" Warrick answered shaking his head and raising his hands in surrender. "Nothing in this case makes sense. Only a dead body, a videotape and these" He said pointing to the plank that lay on the table. I send a sample to Hodges, but I don't think we can't get anything, but it's procedure"

"Well, maybe I could bring you some light in there" He said taping a folder in his hand, and a cryptic smile on his lips.

"What do you have?" Warrick asked watching the man with tired eyes.

"Mandy ran the prints and got a match. But first, where are the others?" He asked searching with his eyes the corridor and the other labs.

"Sara is still watching the tape, and Catherine went to see Dr. Robbins"

"Sara is watching the tape?" Brass asked with surprise. "Is it wasn't your job to do that?"

"What do you mean? She took it and went for it. It's not my decision, but Sara, and Catherine didn't put any objection" Warrick said a little offended.

"You're right. Sorry" Brass replied dismissing his concerns, on the surface only. "Anyway I checked this man. His name was Carl Roth. He was in the system, you know. Got out of jail a couple of month ago." He said not surprised. In his experience he saw a lot of people who committed crimes being condemned for years and got out of jail after just a couple of years.

"Why was he in prison? Drugs?" Warrick asked checking the file Brass just gave him.

"Rape. Four years ago he raped Betty Wilson, who was 17 years old. She testified against him and he got three years of prison." Brass informed him with indifference.

"Only three years? I don't understrand it, man.." He said shaking his head. "What happen to the girl?" Warrick asked.

"I don't know. I didn't check it out yet." He said to Warrick who was still reading the file. "Listen, it was Catherine's case, maybe she'll know something about the girl. It's obvious that we need to interrogate Betty. She's a possible suspect."

At this moment a blonde hurricane passed the layer room. Her heels resonating through the corridors heading to her office, after that a slam could be heard by all the people who were at the Lab.

"Ouch…someone is in a bad mood" Brass said with a grimace of hurt.

"Yeah, and I think I know the reason…." Warrick said looking at Brass with funny eyes and a shy smile in his lips.

"Sara" Both men responded to the unquestioned question. "I think I'm going to see if we have a warrant to Carl Roth's house. Meet me in the Catherine's office, in 5 minutes ok?"

"Ok man." Nodded Warrick to the detective. "Brass" He called to the man who was leaving the room, and was watching him with a hand resting on the door frame. He wanted to say the old man to keep an eye on Sara but dismissed it "Nothing, man"

After a nod, Brass added "Don't worry man, I know she will be all right" He said sensing Warrick's concerns about the young woman. With that he left the room in search of the warrant.

Warrick took off his gloves and went to Catherine's office to inform her about the case and the folder in his hands.

He stared at the door, not knowing if he should knock or just open it. He knew better to knock than to open the door, when all's said and done, it was Catherine's office, and he had not right to just entered. If the door was closed there might be a reason for that. So he knocked two times on the door. After a couple of seconds he heard a _"Come in"_. He entered to the small space that was the office and contemplated an angry Catherine taking notes in her laptop, tapings the keys with force. She didn't raise her head to acknowledge her visitor.

After a couple of seconds in silence she raised her head and look at the door. "What can I do for you Warrick?" She asked to the black man. She had stopped taping on her laptop and was looking him at the eye, expecting a response.

"Are you alright?" He asked taking a seat in front of her. "You seem a little pissed off"

"I'm fine" She answered no leaving any option to discuss her feelings. She then looked at the folder in Warrick's hands. "What you got in there?"

"Brass gave it to me. We identified the victim. His name is…" Looking through the pages of the file.

"Carl Roth, I know" Warrick looked at her in surprise. "In the tape the killer left to us, he mentioned, so I came here to check the files, because that name was familiar to me. It was a case that Sara and I worked. He was condemned for the raping of Betty Wilson" She was watching the screen in her laptop now, reading the same information that Warrick had.

"I was asking Brass what happened to her, but he didn't know. Maybe you could tell me"

"I was checking on the file of Betty Wilson, because according to Carl she killed herself after been raped by him again. It's possible that someone of Betty's family took revenge on him."

"It sounds plausible, for me, but maybe it could have been someone who was dealing with drugs, some kind of revenge"

"Oh, definitely it was for revenge, believe me. I just spend fifteen minutes with Doctor Robbins at the autopsy room and this man was beated, strangled, cut and bled out to death. I think this was revenge for the death of Betty Wilson. She killed herself cutting her wrists and arms, after she was raped again by the vic, and in the videotape we can see a man doing the same to the victim."

"So you saw the tape" Warrick told to Catherine. "No way he deserved to die"

"You too?" She told raising his arms in disbelieve

"Sara thinks the same? Well it's easier to do that. I mean, he hurt Betty Wilson not once, if two, and was for revenge. So whoever killed him did the same to him because of Betty."

"We need to see if there are any relatives of Betty Wilson". She checked the data base and found one relative. "She had a brother. Owen Wilson. Seems we could make him a visit."

"I have a warrant to examine Carl Roth's house" Said Brass from the door. "Who's coming with me?"

"Take Sara with you, I think she deserves a pause from the videotape. Warrick and I are going to visit Owen Wilson, the brother of Betty Wilson.

Brass nodded and left, leaving the two CSI alone. Both of them stood up from their seats, ready to play a visit to Owen Wilson.

TBC


	7. Confrontations

**ACertainJustice and Chelsee6 **I know my grammar it's not really good. I have my faults and nobody is perfect. If you think that I made mistakes, please let me know. I'm full open to suggestions, and a review is a review, that's the use for it. So don't worry and say all the things you have to say, as I said I'm open to read your suggestions and corrections to write better.

**Pole** As you can see this story is about conflicts and there would be more conflicts! Just keep reading and you will see.

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**_Chapter 6 – Confrontations _**

Brass left Catherine's office and went to the A/V Lab in search of Sara. He knew by experience that the brunette had issues with cases involving rapes. _Who hasn't?_ He thought to himself. It was a brutal act, a violation of the integrity of women and in some cases men. But what was worse were the sequels that were left behind along with the difficulties to trust again.

He arrived to the A/V Lab and saw the slim figure of the brunette seated next to Archie who was trying to focus on the sounds of the videotape, replaying again and again a fragment of a bloody face sobbing. Sara was seated with her hands in both sides of the earphones, like Archie, but this one was manipulating with his right hand the audio controllers.

"I'm going to try to adjust the audio, but the sobs of the man make it difficult to separate them from the other voice." Archie was saying concentrated and with his eyes half closed, trying to listened the sounds.

"Do what you have to do Archie, but we need to know what is he saying to him" Sara order, rather than demanded.

Archie looked at her, with a little fear. He knew that Sara was pissed off, but didn't want to question her about that. He learnt years ago not to ask questions that didn't seem to include him.

With the play of another couple of mechanisms and a little magic of the computer, he ended separating two kind of voices.

"All right" He said triumphaly, smiling to Sara whom face was still serious. "Here we have the two voices. The one above is the man on the screen. The other one is noise and the voice of our mystery man. I'm going to play it again to see if we can hear what he is saying"

After a couple of seconds, a sigh of frustration escaped from Sara's lips. Her eyes were closed and she was counting to ten to kept her patience. "Still we can't hear him clearly."

Archie didn't say anything. He was used to be confronted to challenges. He normally got patience enough for the both of them, but the brunette was making him nervous. She was exasperated and her bad mood didn't help him a lot.

"Hey Sara. How is it going with that?"

Sara took off the earphones and turn to see a smiling Brass leaning against the door frame. She returned his smile. Brass had always cheered her up a little. She didn't know how he did it but it was true.

"Hey Brass. Not very well. We are trying to decipher a second voice." She said with a tired smile. _She looks like she needed a break. Maybe the ride to Carl's house was a good idea, and on the way there we could have a coffee and make small talk_. _The girl needs a break._ Brass thought to himself.

"I can see that" He saw Archie's face who was pleading him to take Sara out of there. "Maybe we could leave Archie with this and go to take a coffee and play a visit to Carl Roth's house"

"I don't know, Brass, I'm stuck here with Archie and the videotape, maybe Warrick could go with you" She said. She didn't want to leave the videotape. Something was telling her that the only evidence that could help them was the videotape and she was determinated to find out what that something was.

"I talked to Catherine and she thinks that you are my girl" He said with a twinkle in his eye to her. "Also Warrick is not my type, and he and Catherine are going to the house of the brother of the poor girl that, that mother fucker rapped"

"Could you give me a couple of minutes to take my things? I'll be with you in five minutes." She stood up from the chair quickly, turned to Archie and said "Keep me informed about this. I want to know what he is saying, ok?" After Archie nodded she left heading to Catherine's office, but she didn't find her. So she went to the Locker Room to take her belongs. There she found the one she was looking for.

Catherine was putting her jacket on, when the brunette entered like a wild cat. "Why are you sending me to Carl's house? I was trying to figured out what the mysterious man was saying!!!" She said trying to keep her tone calm, but failing.

Catherine, raised her head, and looked at Sara, furrowing her brows she said to her "I think you need a break from that videotape." She said it in a serious tone. "And I'm going with Warrick to see if the brother of Betty Wilson can tell us something about her death."

"Betty Wilson? Now I remember! I knew that the name of Carl Roth was familiar to me." She said angrier than before, but this time, it wasn't directed to Catherine but to the bloody man of the videotape.

"Yeah, I found a couple of minutes ago that she killed herself, like Carl said in the videotape and that the only relative alive is her brother. So Now I'm going to see him, and you…" She said pointing a finger to Sara "you are going to inspect the house of the victim"

"What victim? The one on the videotape or the one Carl raped?"

"Don't start again Sara" Catherine warned.

"Ok, you're the boss, aren't you?" This was said with a tone full of resentment that didn't escape to the blonde.

Sara reached her locker, took her jacket and exited the locker room the same way she had entered it, leaving Catherine with the word in her mouth.

"Yeah, I'm the boss…" Said Catherine after Sara had left the room just in a whisper full of pain. She didn't know how to approach the young woman without fighting or making her angry, and that frustrated her, because deep in her heart she cared a lot for her. But it seemed that every time they work a case, there was a war between the two of them, and that made Catherine sad.

She didn't need to fight with a co-worker, even less with the only female co-worker. When they worked a case together, they were good at their job, but they were too far away from been friendly, especially with cases involving rapes. Sara always took it personally, and that wasn't the best way to solve a case.

Brass was waiting for Sara at the A/V Lab. He had asked to Archie to play the videotape again just to see why Sara was so upset. The moment he heard Carl's confession, he knew what made the brunette mad, adding that maybe Catherine wasn't helping too much treating Sara the way she did.

"Thank you, Archie" He said to the Lab technician. He put on the table the headphones and sigh.

"You're welcome" Was Archie replied. "You know, sometimes I hate this job. There are times that it's funny, but seeing this man on this state it's depressing. I know I don't have to feel bad for the poor guy, but even if he did what he said, I think that no one deserves a death like that" He added in a sad tone.

"Maybe you are right, Archie" Brass said. He was going to add something else, but at this moment Sara entered saying she was ready to leave. "You ready?" With a nod of her head, she stared to the screen while Archie put the headphones on, and press play.

"Let's go, Brass" She said without looking to him and heading to the exit. Brass followed her and entered in his car. Sara took her Tahoe and followed him through the traffic of Las Vegas. She was thinking about the case she had work with Catherine, the Wilson's case. She remember it was a seventeen years old girl, who had been raped. Catherine interviewed the man, meanwhile she was searching his house.

She remembered finding all the evidence: the rope he used to kept her still, pictures of the girl, the sheets full of his semen and blood of Betty. She remembered Betty, remembered how scared she was of identifying him. She understood her fear, she could felt it, but that didn't help Betty, because she was dead, and the fact that her rapist was dead didn't relieve the feeling of impotence that she felt then and still felt now.

TBC


	8. The house of a rapist

**AN**:Thank you Pole! I know I make mistakes. Please be patience with me.

Enjoy the reading and please use the reviews. I'd like to know what you thought about it.

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**_Chapter 7 – The house of a rapist_**

Sara was following Brass's car through the traffic of Las Vegas. She was still with her thoughts about Betty Wilson, when Brass stopped his car at the front of an apartment building. Sara stepped out of her Tahoe and looked up at the building. The building was all but fashioned. The façade was filthy, and you could see clotheslines going from one window to another, full of clothes. There were four floors, and Carl's apartment was on the second one.

She still remembered the first time she had been there. There were children playing at the entrance and she thought that it was an irony that none of these children were victims of Carl's.

Brass was heading to the entrance when he looked at her. Her jaw tensed and the look fixed on the second floor. He was studying her, but couldn't see her eyes that where hidden behind her sunglasses. Sara sensed that Brass was inspecting her, and looked at him, bringing him a little smile to let him know that she was fine. He returned her smile and entered in the building followed by Sara

There wasn't any elevator so they took the stairs. There was dirt everywhere. A couple of rubbish bags piled up in the corner of the landing, tins of beer spreaded through the floor, papers, and things that Sara didn't want to know. The smell was sickening, so they were forced to breath through their mouths. In short it wasn't the best place to live, but now didn't care.

When they reached the second floor they could see an officer waiting for them at the door number 7. Brass greeted the man with a nod.

"The owner says that there's no one at the apartment, Captain" Agent Travis said to the detective. He looked then at Sara who was behind Brass and nodded to her. She returned the nod and spoke to both of them.

"Do we have the keys?"

"Yes, ma'am. I was waiting for you to open the apartment." He said none attached.

"Ok, let's go in" said Brass, rearching for his gun. Both men took places in both sides of the door. Brass had a hand on the gun and used the other one to knock on the door. "Las Vegas P.D., open up!" He said. There wasn't any indication of movement or any reply so he made a sign to the officer to open the door with the keys.

Once the door was opened they step into the apartment, leaving Sara outside. About thirty seconds later, Brass head appeared.

"It's clear, you can enter now" he said to Sara who was still waiting kit in hand in the corridor.

She entered the apartment, once again. Three years had passed and everything was still the same. The same awful furniture, the same chaos of papers, and clothes every where. Seemed like the apartment and the building were a package.

She started to inspect the kitchen drawers, searching for any clue that related the killer to the victim, but the only thing she found were trading stamps, kitchen knives and a pair of magazines.

She then, went to the living room or what it seemed. There was a sofa in front of an old TV and a coffee table. At the table there were two bottles of beer. She took a sample of the bottles hoping one was used by the killer, and baggage it marking it with her initials. She looked under the sofa, and found a pair of pants. It was a child's underwear. She looked to Brass, who had his eyes fixed in the piece of cloth that Sara was holding. She shook her head with sadness.

"I think bad habits never die" said Brass to her. She didn't respond. She put the cloth in a bag and stood up, heading to the bedroom. The bed was unmade. She closed the curtains, put on the glasses and turned the ALS on, in search of other evidences. She found remains of semen and vaginal contributions. She took samples of both of them.

The memories of three years ago returned to her mind. She did the same for Betty, now she was doing it but for other reasons, not to catch him, but to catch the killer of a rapist. This made her sick and furious. She knew that it was possible that there was another victim of Carl's appetite, but it had to wait until they solve the murder. That made her sad, the fact that Carl was punished for one crime when it was possible he committed another one and didn't pay for this one.

A sound caugh her attention. It was a 'bip'. It only sound once. So she stay still since another 'bip' reached her ears. It was a phone she was sure of it, and by the sound she guessed that the battery was very low. She heard it again under the bed, so she looked there and found the item. It was a cell phone. She tried to see anything but at this moment the battery died. A sigh of frustration escape from her lips.

"I found a phone under the bed, but the battery is dead" She look at it again "Maybe Archie could examined it"

"Yeah, but please, be nice with him, ok? Brass told to her.

"I'm nice to him" She said defensively. Seeing Brass face, she modified her respond "Ok, maybe I was a little hard with him. Don't worry…I…apologize to him when we'll back to the Lab" She added shyly

"You're done, yet?

"No, I still need to check the bathroom, then I'll be done." she said opening the door that lead to the bathroom. It was dark in there so she turned on the light. A simple shower, a washbasin and a dirty toilet where the only things that she found at simple view. Under the washbasin she found a basket with a pair of used condoms. There was a cabinet, she opened it and saw a bottle on methadone half empty. She took it all and baggage it.

When Sara was exiting of the bathroom another sound reach their ears. It was like a sob. They stood quiet looking at each other. The sob could be heard again, it came from the closet in front of the bed. Sara could saw her reflexion in the mirror of the door of the closet. Carefully, she left her kit on the floor and reached her gun. Brass was aiming his gun and slowly stepping to the closet. He positioned it in the left side of the closed, meanwhile Sara was pointing the front with her gun. She didn't want to shoot anybody, so she had to be sure of what she'll see in order to keep her calm. She took a breath and nodded to Brass who was now opening the sliding door of the closet.

Inside the closet they found a child curled up, trembling to the sight of two guns pointing to his face. He was scared to death. and the sobbings increceased. At this point, Sara was aware of the poor child, sheathed the gun, and run to the kid. She knelt down in front of him and started to talk to him.

"Don't worry; It's ok...shh..." She tried to reach the boy with her hand but the boy refused any contact with her. He was only wearing a diaper and a dirty t-shirt "Ok, don't worry. I'm not going to hurt you" She said with a calming voice. "Are you hurt?" She asked to the boy, who shook his head still refusing the contact with the woman. "Could you tell me your name, kiddo?" she said in a sweat voice that surprise Brass who was calling for an ambulance, in case the boy needed it.

"My..."He started to said in a trembling and husky voice..."I'm Junior...Carl Roth, jr" His eyes were full of terror, and his little hands were pressed together like he was praying.

"It's ok, Carl" Sara said in the sweetness tone she could and smiling at the young boy "I'm Sara...and this big man, is Jim Brass. You don't have to be afraid of us, we work for the police" The boy seemed to get down his defenses. Sara extended a hand to help him to get out of the closet. "Come on, sweety, let's get out of this awful closet, ok?"

The boy looked at Brass who was smiling to him. He then looked to the hand that Sara was offering him. With a shaky hand he took it in his and slowly he got out of the closet. Every step was painful to the boy. He was scared, but there was something inside him that was telling him to trust the woman in front of him. He took a few indecisive steps towards Sara, till he reached her arms completely, resting his head in Sara's shoulder. Sara could feel the tears of the boy trespassing her t-shirt. She was sorry for the little boy. He smelled badly, but she didn't care. He was safe for now and she tried to transfer that feeling to the little boy.

She wrapped her arms, enveloping the little boy in her embrace and shouting words of comfort. Brass was watching them with sadness. After what seem like an eternity, the paramedics arrived and tried to take the boy from Sara but Junior didn't break the embrace with her. She tried to explain to him but he refused to listen and started crying out loud.

Sara and Brass shared a look. They now need to deal with a little boy about five years old, scared to death and a possible witness of the man or men who took Carl Roth's and killed him, leaving this little boy fatherless.

TBC


	9. The boy with the thorn in his side

**_Chapter 8 – The boy with the thorn in his side _**

The paramedics were checking on Junior. He never let go of Sara's hand. It was the only way to keep him quiet. Since they'd found him, Sara was stuck with him. Brass was marvelled with Sara and her skills with children. She was always saying that she wasn't good with kids, but the sight in front of him was another story. Sara calmed the boy quickly and was talking to him all the time, saying things to distract him from what the paramedics were doing him.

They had brought the boy to the hospital. There was a doctor examining him. The boy was dehydrated, and had little contusions on the back. He had been abused, and that made Sara angrier. She took photographs of his wounds. Every flash was a painful memory to her. She hated cases like this, she always hated them.

Sara was now outside of the room, on the phone talking to Catherine to take over from the child, but to Brass it was a lost battle. Meanwhile a psychologist was trying to speak with the boy unsuccessfully.

"Catherine, I can't take care of him! I'm at the hospital right now and I need to go to the Lab to process some evidences I found! I just can't do this!" Brass heard the exasperate tone of the brunette.

_"Sara, it's only a child, for God's sake!"_ The blonde replied over the phone. _"He won't bite you"_

"You are the person with people's skills. Not me!" She tried not to be heard by the boy who was now seated on a stretcher, with his eyes lost on the floor. He didn't say much apart of his name. "I'm not good with kids! What am I suppose that I have to do with this boy, bring him to the Lab"

_"Nobody is telling you to adopt him, only to take care of him until Child Services arrives"_ Catherine was turning angrier by the time. The conversation started about five minutes ago and she needed bring it to an end.

"You are the one with a child, you should be here, not me" She said coldly to the phone.

_"Sara, you were good with Brenda Collins the first year you came. I don't see what the problem is with this kid!" _

"I wasn't good with her. I didn't do anything" She replied, remembering how the little girl had trusted her. She only was there for her. Even now every week Child Services informed her about the progress on Brenda.

_"Then do nothing!"_ Catherine said aloud.

"I…" Sara said, but she then heard a click and the communication ended "Hello?" She stared at her phone just to verify that Catherine had hung up on her. "I can't believe this! She just hung up on me!" She said in disbelief to Brass who shrugged his shoulders in response.

"Believe it or not you are good with kids, Sara. Everybody knows it. You made it with the Collins' case."

"Don't start you too." She pointed a finger to him as a warning. She was furious with Catherine and to the man who left a boy in a closet during who knows how much time. The doctors informed them that the boy was dehydrated and in a catatonic state. They gave him some medicines and with Sara's help they could change him in other clothes. Sara took his old clothes and put them into a bag to process it when she'll return to the Lab.

She stared at the boy. He was lost somewhere in his mind. She didn't know how to treat him. _'It's only a child, for god's sake!'_ Catherine's words echoed in her head. She only needed to stay with him for a couple of hours maybe and Child Services will take care of him. "_That look…"_ she thought to herself _"That's the same look I had. He knows that her dad is dead, in some way he knows"_

She kneeled in front of the boy and took his hand in hers. He lifted his head and looked at her in the eyes. She could feel all the sadness, pain, terror and…she couldn't put a finger on it, but there was hope and pleading too. It was just a look full of sentiments.

"Come on, Carl. Seems like you're gonna be stuck with us for a while" she said with the shadow of a smile on her lips.

"You can ride with me, Sara. An officer will take care of your car" Brass said softly to the brunette. She didn't like the idea of someone else driving her car, but it was the only way to drive it back to the police station with the boy.

"Ok" She said, never leaving the eyes of the boy. They, slowly, stood up and exited the hospital entrance heading to Brass's car. She opened the back door and guide Junior in, she then entered with him, never leaving his hand.

Brass drove them to the police station. Through the rear-view mirror he contemplated the two of them. The look in their eyes was the same. It broke his heart to see them. He could remember vividly Sara's look being exactly the same at one moment and that was when Suzanne Kirwood was murdered. She was so lost, like the child who was seated next to her.

The ride was completely silent. Neither of them dared to break the silence. There were a million of thoughts crossing their minds. The first ones that crossed Sara's, was where was the boy's mother and why he was left alone in the apartment being so young.

The boy's tears were dry now and they had left cleaning lines on his cheeks. He looked through the window to the traffic of Las Vegas. He was watching the sunset with melancholy. He knew that something bad happened but he didn't know what it was. He couldn't think of anything. His mind was full of sadness. He rested his head on Sara's arm who was watching through the window as well. When she felt the weight in her arm she didn't turn her head to the boy. She wasn't mad at him. She was mad at the world in general, because this world allowed that kind of situations.

When they arrived at the station, they went directly to Brass' office. There Carl Roth's son lie on the couch that so many times the captain had used, when he didn't want to go back to an empty house. Finally the boy was sleep.

Brass and Sara watched him closely. The clothes that the paramedics gave them were too large for him. His sleep seemed calm but full of nightmares.

Sara broke the silence that was set since they had left the hospital. "We need to contact her mother"

"I checked before we left" he made a dramatic pause "She died a month ago"

"Any relatives?" Sara asked full of concern.

"No, that we know of"

A sigh full of sadness was the only response of the brunette. During the brief talk, neither of them broke the contact eye with the child. He was now an orphan, and soon Child Services would take care of him. Sara knew what it was like to be on the system, and she hoped this little boy will go to a home full of love and comprehension.

After a long silence, Sara looked at Brass and informed him that she was going to process all the evidence found in the apartment and asked him to call her if the boy woke. She didn't tell him that she was going to check the child's underwear to see if it belonged to Junior. She needed to be alone, so she went to the restroom and sat on the toilet. That's when she silently started to cry for the boy, for her father, and for all the memories that infest her mind.

TBC

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_The boy with the thorn in his side - _The Smiths from the album "The Queen is dead" (1986) 


	10. Betty Wilson

**AN: **Remeber reviews are the only way to know if you are enjoying the story or not, so please put them.**_  
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**_Chapter 9 – Betty Wilson_**

An irritated Catherine closed the phone in her hand. She just spent five whole minutes discussing with Sara about the boy she and Brass had found in a closet. She knew that Sara was capable of handling him, she did it with Brenda Collins. With Brenda, Sara was the only one who could reach the little girl. She had been witness of the interaction between the two of them. It just pissed her off that the fact that she was a mother was a constant to treat children. Sometimes she couldn't reach her own daughter, something Sara didn't have trouble with.

Catherine returned to the living room where Warrick and Mr. Wilson were expecting her. They were in the middle of a conversation about Betty when the phone had ring.

Sara had a bad timing when she called and Catherine was furious about that, but when she entered the room, her expression softened.

In words of her brother, Betty Wilson was special. He had told them that he always admired her because she was smart, funny, she always worked hard to be able to go to Harvard to study mathematics, and was a regular on the Church.

By the way he spoke of his sister, Catherine could see that he loved her. It was the kind of love that a father shows to his daughter. Their history wasn't very pleasant. A mother who died when she gave birth to Betty, a father who died of a heart attack when Betty was ten, the rape, the trial.

"But she overcome it" Mr. Wilson was saying when Catherine took a seat next to Warrick on the sofa in front of the man. He was devastated by his sister's loss, and there was a mist in his eyes, like he was going to cry at any time.

He passed a photograph to Catherine who took it and examined it. It was a photograph of a group of people, in the centre of the picture was a young girl smiling. Above the heads of the group was a placard it said _" Saint Thomas' church"._ She was beautiful, and full of life. Next to her was a man dressed in black with a clerical collar. There were five other people, including Owen Wilson who was on the right side of the girl with and arm over the girl's shoulders. They were smiling to the camera. Catherine couldn't stop the thought that the girl was exceptional. She was good looking like her brother, and had an intense look, sparkling with life, a life that was changed when Carl Roth raped her.

"When was this picture taken?" Catherine asked returning the picture to the man in front of her.

"It was during Betty's seventeenth birthday." Mr Wilson answered. "She was very helpful at the church. Always was laughing and happy. She was special."

"Who's the man next to her? It seems that they were good friends" She asked pointing to the man dressed in black. He was in his forties and had a powerful presence even in a photograph. But he was looking at the girl like he was her daughter.

"It's Father Silecio" Mr. Wilson said. "He runs Saint Thomas' Church. It's a good friend and he helped me to reach Betty when she was….raped"

It was obvious to Catherine that Owen loved her sister, and sometimes this loved could be turned into wrath to the victim of her case. She had stated a long time ago that if anything happen to Lindsey she would be capable of murder. First she was her child, and then even if they weren't, right now on the best terms she loved her with all of her heart. So she'd understand that talking about the rapist of her sister could be painful and unchain feelings of rage and fury, and wishes of seeing the man dead. But she needed to ask.

"Mr. Wilson, the name of Carl Roth is familiar to you?"

"Of course it's familiar to me!" He snap, he had passed from almost crying to an access of controlled fury. "He is the bastard that raped my sister. She passed through a hell during the trial. He took all his youth, her smile, her innocence from her" He was furious now and there were tears in his eyes. "She was the only family I had. That was when I lost my sister for the first time. Losing her was losing my life" he wiped the tears with the back of his hand.

He took a couple of deep breaths and continued "I though that all about Betty's … rape was solved. That it was a case closed"

"I'm sorry to bring to you bad memories, but the matter is that we have a few questions about the last time you saw Carl Roth" Catherine said gently

"Why?"

"Sir, please, answer the question" Warrick said to the man seriously but at the same time gently.

"I told you when was the last time I saw him! It was when a jury of twelve people condemned him to four years of prison." He was angrier. Talking about the rapist of her sister it was something he didn't want. It brought him to lose control.

"So you didn't see him after the trial?"

"No, I don't, and I don't understand why are you asking me about him?" He said angrier than before. He hated this man to the bone.

"Mr. Wilson, we found Carl Roth dead in not very peaceful circumstances"

"I hope he suffer like the pig he was!" Mr Wilson said with a whisper full of rage.

"He suffered" Catherine confirmed. "I know this is difficult to you, but we need to know where you were this morning"

He looked her like she had slapped him in the face and the angry look turned to appear.

"Are you accusing me of something?" He asked looking to Catherine. Warrick stiffened, ready to defend her if it was necessary.

"We are not accusing you of anything, but you need to understand that we have to investigate all points of view" Warrick said calmly

"I was with father Silecio all the morning, we had lunch together. He is the person who helped my sister and me in many ways." He looked back at the picture. "All of them helped us to find the peace"

"Did you know that when Carl Roth was release from jail he raped her again?"

There was an uncomfortable silence. His eyes went from Catherine to Warrick. There was surprise and stupor in them.

"No… No, I didn't know." He made a pause, letting the photograph on the coffee table "But in someway I knew that something happened to Betty. Two days before she…killed herself…I found her in the church crying. I tried to ask her what was wrong but she refused any physical contact. I asked her what happened, but she didn't tell me anything, just to stay away of her." He swallowed "The symptoms were there, but she didn't want anything. She just kept crying. Two days later I found her in the bathroom…."

"I'm so sorry for your loss. I know this is difficult for you, but we need to verify your statement. It's procedure." Catherine said to the man softly

"I understand" He said nodding. "You can find him on the Church, I'll give you the address" He stood up and went for a card.

Catherine and Warrick examined the room. There were a few photographs on the chimney. Most of them of the two brothers. She could see that they were very united. A few photograph were from the same group climbing a mountain, on a barbecue or in a Lake wearing diving suits. They seemed a compact group.

She looked through the library next to the chimney. There were plenty of books about chemistry, mathematics, religion, history. He seemed a culture person, versed in different areas from chemicals to poetry

She was examining a book of religion in question when Owen Wilson returned and handed her a card with the directions of the church.

After a few exchange of words, they left the house. When they exited, Catherine examined the house. It was a regular house in a calm neighborhood. Identical houses with white railings painted in white. She wondered how people could find their homes when they were drunk. With that thought they reached the Tahoe and drove off.

TBC


	11. Mute Witness

**_AN:_** Today is Tuesday, and here is another chapter. Reviews are welcome**_

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**_Chapter 10 – Mute Witness_ **

Archie and Sara were re-watching again and again the videotape, trying to figured put what the second voice was saying. An hour before, Archie could separate the voice from the noise underlying. He was playing with the controls with thorough calm, sure of not making any mistakes.

He played again the videotape and pay attention to what was said. It was only like a whisper._ "Honesty is always worthy of praise, even though does not report utility, neither compensates, nor benefit"_ _"Confess what you've done or your son will suffer the consequences" _

"Cicerone" Sara said in a whisper.

"What?" Archie asked confused.

"He is quoting Cicerone, Archie" He looked at her with and odd look. He didn't understand what she was saying.

"That means, that whoever this man is, he's intelligent or has studied Philosophy" She said without enthusiasm. She knew that this quote didn't have a real signification, but it was something to help them to make the profile of Carl Roth's killer.

"You're not a philosopher and you knew the quote" He pointed with a smile in his lips.

"Yeah, but I studied the great philosophers when I was in college, and I have a good memory" She added with a wink at him.

He smiled at her. That was the old Sara he missed, the one that occasionally flirt with him.

Archie played again the videotape. He frowned and concentrated on the voice. He stopped the videotape after a moment and looked to Sara.

"There's another voice"

"What do you mean?" She asked turning to Archie.

"I think that there is a third voice in the tape." He replied it again. "First I thought that there were two voices, one from the vic and the other one that you just heard, but, the tone of the voice in the spectrograph it's different. Doesn't match the one we just listened. I mean, the quote you just identify, doesn't match the followed sentence."

"Play it again, Archie" She said putting on the earphones again.

_"Confess what you've done or your son will suffer the consequences"_ Archie was right, it was another voice. A voice full of controlled rage. Sara could imagine someone speaking with his teeth greeted.

"Put the voice so that it can be heard at first, and compare it with this one" She said.

Archie did it. On the second screen they had the audio spectrograph. The lines where forming themselves corners upside and down.

_"Tell them what happened next!!"_ They heard again the imperative of the voice. It was an order.

"It's a match." He said to her. "There was another person with them."

At this moment Sara's pager went off. She looked at the message. It was from Brass. '_The boy woke up',_ she could read. She stood up and told Archie she needed to go and to inform Catherine of her whereabouts. He nodded and put on the earphones again.

Sara went to the police station in search of Brass. She founded him talking to Catherine outside of his office. Brass was the first to saw her, and greeted her with a smile in her lips.

"He is asking for you" Brass said to her.

"Obviously you did a good job with the boy because he only wants to talk to you." Catherine said. "I just been here since Brass informed you, but as I told you, you don't need me here" She said with a smile in her face.

Junior had been crying all the time, but when he saw Sara he looked at her with hopeful eyes. There were many people around and he didn't like it. The only one who he could trust was the brunette that found him.

She entered the office with decision and kneeled in front of the boy who was seated in Brass' couch. He looked at her with expectant eyes. Brass and Catherine were observing her, Sara could feel them, watching every move she made. It made her uncomfortable.

"Hi Junior" She said shyly. "Do you remember me?"

The boy nodded to her. He directed a look to the other two persons in the room. He was tensed, and afraid.

"It's all right, Junior. You do remember Captain Brass, don't you?" She asked gentle.

The boy nodded again. He then looked at Catherine who had a slight smile. He could trust her, but was afraid of too many people. He turned rapidly his head to Sara, and looked her with supplicant eyes.

She nodded to Junior, letting him know that she understood his request, and go to Brass and Catherine.

"We need some privacy in here. Do you mind if I try to speak to him alone?" She asked looking at Catherine. She was going to said something but dismissed.

"We'll be outside if you need us". With that Brass and Catherine left the office letting the door half open.

Sara returned to the boy and seated next to him. She had brought him chocolate from the coffee machine.

"Here, this is for you" She said offering him the mug of chocolate. "It warm you, it's chocolate"

The boy took it and drank a little. His eyes were somewhere, fixed on the wall in front of him. Sara didn't know how to act in front of him. There was an intense silence. She was watching the wall like the answers to her questions were written there. She needed to question the boy so she turned to him.

"Carl" She called. But the boy didn't responded. He kept looking the wall.

"Junior" She asked again using his nickname. This time the boy reacted. He turned to her expecting.

"I need to ask you a few questions. Is that ok with you?" She asked. The boy seemed to consider it a few moments and then nodded. His movements were slow. He brought the cup of chocolate to his lips, when a sleeve of the shirt he was wearing showed a purple in his arm.

Sara contemplated it. She needed to know if that purples were made by his father or by another person.

"Did your father make this to you?" She said pointing the purple in his right arm. There was kindness in her voice, but the mention of his father made Junior shake, dropping the cup of coffee to the floor, spilling the chocolate through the floor.

It was the answer that Sara needed, and that made her mad. But another feeling was there, pity.

The boy started to cry silently and began to shake. Sara took his hands in hers.

"It's ok, Junior. He's not here, he's not going to hurt you. You're safe"

That calmed the boy. He needed to focus on this woman, that woman was going to protect him from his father and the others.

After a moment and when the sacking subsided, she cleaned the chocolate that was on the floor. After that she looked into the boy's eyes.

"I know this is difficult to you, but, did you see your father this morning?"

The boy shook her head.

"Did you see him yesterday?" She asked, trying to put a time line. He shook again his head.

"Did you see him the day before yesterday?" She asked again

This time the boy nodded and began to shake again.

"Did he beat you?" She asked, trying to suppress the rage that was boiling inside her.

Junior nodded again and began to cry silently. Sara put her hand on his shoulder and brought him to her. The boy didn't resist and gave in as his sobs increased.

"It's okay, don't worry. It's going to be all right." She said, but she knew out of experience that it wasn't going to be all right. He was going to be on the system and with luck he'll found a good family, but those were counted cases.

When he calmed down, he pulled back without breaking the contact completely. She needed to know if the boy had saw anybody else apart from his father. He was a possible witness.

"Junior, the last time you saw your father…did you see anyone else?"

He nodded again. _So there was somebody with him_ Sara thought to herself. "Is it was a man?" The boy nodded.

"Could you see him?" She asked hopefully. He shook his head. This was going to be more difficult than it was before. She thought about the tape and the third voice.

"You did very good, Junior" She said passing a hand trough his air and smiling to him. It was a sad smile, because she knew that he had to listen the tape, or at least part of the tape.

She heard someone outside Brass' office. She turned to see a woman in his fifties, talking with Brass and Catherine.

She turned to the boy who was watching the scene in front of them. They could see it through the office window. A feeling of protectiveness started to show on Sara's eyes. She knew that the woman was from Child Services and that she was going to take Junior away from them, away from her. It broke her heart, but it was the procedure.

"I'm going outside a moment." She said. Junior grasped her hand like his life depended of it. He didn't want to be alone. "It's only a minute, and I'll be just there" She added pointing to where the three persons where. "You can see me through the window" She said with a smile.

The boy studied her like he didn't know if she was telling the truth or not. He nodded, and let go of her hand. She stood up and went to meet the woman.

"We are making progress in this investigation, thanks to the boy. You can't take him now" Catherine was saying to the woman.

"I understand Miss Willows, but we need to take care of him, and a police station it's not the place to be for a boy"

"Catherine, can I talk to you for a minute?" Sara asked to the blonde interrupting the conversation.

"Miss…" The other woman started, but was cut by Catherine who just dismissed her, leaving her with Brass and going with Sara.

"Child Services is here to take the boy. Our time is off." Catherine said to Sara.

"I know, but I need Junior to listen the tape" She said serious.

Catherine arched a brown. She noticed that Sara had call him 'Junior' instead of 'the boy'. It wasn't a good sign to her.

"What? Are you crazy? He can't listen the tape. It could affect him too much. You could add another trauma to the poor boy" She was astonished about Sara's request.

"Not the entirely tape, and even less see it. I just need him to listen the voices." Catherine was about to protest when she cut her. "Look, Archie and I found a third voice on the tape. He only needs to listen to a few fragments and nothing else, to see if he could recognize the voice."

Catherine looked at the brunette eyes. There were beautiful eyes full of determination. Sara wasn't about to take a 'no' as a response.

The blonde sighed and looked to the young boy. He was watching them with an intense and haunted look. It was going to be a hell to convince the woman of Child Services, but they needed to try.

"Okay" She said without breaking the eye contact with the boy. "But" she added this time directing her to Sara "this is not going to prove anything. We don't know who the other voice is, neither the second"

"I know, but we may try, Cath" She said. With that she entered again in Brass's office, took her phone and dialed Archie's number.

"Archie, It's Sara. I need you to prepare some fragments of the tape. Just audio"

TBC


	12. Listen

**_Chapter 11 – Listen _**

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The audio cassette was ready to be used. Archie had extracted all the audio and separated it in three fragments as Sara had requested. He had brought it to Brass' office where he found three people outside. Catherine was discussing with a woman and Brass was watching with a tired face and folded arms over his chest, the exchange of words between the two women.

Archie was looking for Sara who was nowhere at first sight. He directed a questioned look to Brass who with a move of his head indicated where she could find her. When he entered the office she found Sara seated on Brass' couch lost in her thoughts. In her right hand was a little hand that belonged to a child not older than five. He was looking too the wall in front of him.

His presence was unknown for the two occupants of the office, so he cough to attract Sara's attention. She looked up at him. She was so pale and tired. There were bags under her eyes, and her look didn't seem to focus on him. Archie rose a hand in which was the audio cassette. Sara blinked a few times and stood up, freeing the hand of the boy that was next to her, and met Archie at the door.

The boy sensing the absence of contact, looked at his hand, and then at the two persons who where in the office. One of them was wearing a blue lab coat, and was watching him nervously. He could see Sara asking something to the man, but he couldn't heard what she was saying. The man leaned and whispered a few word in Sara's ear. They were commenting something about the audio tape that the man was holding in his right hand.

After a few moments, Sara went outside and spoke to Catherine, interrupting once again the excited discussion that she was having with the other woman.

Brass entered in his office followed by Catherine, the woman and Sara, who took a seat next to the boy. The detective was searching for a cassette player in the drawers of his desktop. When he found it, Sara gave him the tape. Once in Brass' hand he inserted it and waited. Sara turned to the boy

"Junior, I want you to listen to this tape and tell me if you recognize any voice" She told him.

There was a tensed silence that could be cut with a knife. None of the five people spoke. Junior, stood up in front of Brass' desktop, ready to do what Sara had requested. With a nod of her head, Sara silently ordered Brass to play the tape.

A husky voice was heard _"My name is…Carl Roth…"_ Brass pushed the key pause.

"Do you recognize this voice?" The boy nodded. He was scared of that voice. He knew that it was his father's, and that made him shake a little, but a warm hand was on his shoulder supporting him. It was Sara's.

"Is it your father's voice?" She asked to him. He nodded again.

Sara directed a look to Brass who played again the tape. _"Honesty is always worthy of praise, even though does not report utility, neither compensates, nor benefit"_

He didn't respond to the voice. It was a melodic, but at the same time powerful voice. It didn't scare him, it was almost hypnotic.

"And what about this voice? Do you recognize it?" Sara asked again to the boy. Junior shook his head.

"Are you sure?" He nodded. He hadn't heard that voice before.

Brass played again the tape. _"Tell them what happened next!?"_ That voice scared him. He began to shake, more than before. He knew the voice. That voice was the one who was with his father.

"Is it the voice of the man who was with your father the last time you saw him?" Sara asked, focused on the boy's reaction. Junior nodded insistent with his head.

"It's ok, Junior. You did a good job" Sara said with a sad smile on her lips.

The shacking had subsided and the boy was looking at her, but Sara got distracted speaking with Catherine and the woman from Child Services. They were discussing. Junior didn't know what was happening, only that he need to tell them more. He couldn't open his mouth, he tried, but couldn't. It was frustrating for him. He needed to let her know. Quietly, he went to Sara's side and grabbed the back of her jacket and started tugging it to get Sara's attention.

Sara looked down at the boy, who was now looking directly at her. There was something else, she could sense it. She kneeled down in front of him and watched him to the eye.

"What is it, Junior?" She asked concerned.

He was trying but it was difficult to him. He forced himself to concentrate and opened his mouth. He just needed to say it. He closed his eyes and ordered to his brain to open his mouth, and let the words escape.

"A girl was too" It was a whisper but Sara could heard him very well. She was confused and surprise at the same time that Junior had spoken and he was giving another clue to the investigation.

He had done it. At last he had told her. Sara was watching him. Catherine and the other woman had stopped and were looking at them. All of them were surprised that the boy had spoken, and they were expecting him to continue, but he couldn't. He made and effort and then fell in silence one more time.

"Do you mean there was a woman and a man with your father?" Sara asked confused. A sudden urgency running thought her mind. She needed to know what he saw, and what the woman was like.

The boy nodded. This case was more complicated.

"Did you see her?" She asked him suddenly. He nodded again.

"Was she like me?" Sara asked grabbing her hair as an indication. He shook his head, and pointed to Catherine. '_So, she was blonde'_ Sara thought to herself.

She asked more questions but the boy didn't know how to answer them. He was tired, and he had only saw her a few times.

The women from Child Service, Miranda Watson, was her name, was putting and effort to make more difficult to the CSI's to talk to the boy or at least asked him.

Sara was loosing her patience as she was asking the boy. He provided a new information, crucial to the case, and now he was muteness. That change in Sara's behavior frightened Junior. The woman who had found him was no longer kind with him, she was turning more impatient and the lack of response from Junior made her a little angrier.

"Ok, I think that's enough" Ms. Watson said abruptly. "He is in a catatonic state, and he shouldn't be here. This is traumatic for the child."

"The _child_, has a name" Sara had had enough too of that woman who was irritating her. Maybe Catherine was the people's person but not with that Miranda. She stood up and prepared to confront her.

Catherine watched the scene; she had to stop Sara before the brunette made a mistake. Quietly she put her hand on Sara's arm, to prevent her to continue.

"Miss Watson, we can make a deal, here" She said with her best smile. "You could take the … Junior" She corrected herself and looking at Sara "…and in case we have more questions to him, let us to question him"

Miranda Watson was going to protest, when Catherine rise a hand to stop her.

"That would be in the presence of a worker of Child Services" The blonde added.

Watson looked to the both women. The brunette seemed ready to jump to her throat, and the blonde seemed more reasonable. She considered the offer for a few moments.

"Okay, but first the _boy_ has to be checked by one of our psychologists, and if our psychologist says that the boy it's not ready then there wouldn't be more questions"

Catherine looked at Sara, and then to Junior who was grabbing Sara's jacket firmly. She could see how the brunette was attached to the boy and vice versa.

"That seems fair enough" Catherine said finally. Sara let out a sigh of discomfort; meanwhile Miranda was smiling to Catherine.

They were taking baby steps, but it was new information. Sara only hoped that they could find evidence of that woman. Maybe, the samples she collected at the apartment lead them to the perpetrators of Carl Roth's murder.

TBC


	13. Take a break

**AN:**Sorry Pole, but we need a break on the story. So it's possible you are not going to enjoy this chapter more than others. But keep reading because things are going to be more interested ;-)

Reviews are always welcome

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**_Chapter 12 – Take a Break _**

The boy was no longer with them. Miranda Watson took him with her and now Sara felt the void. She was in the break room sipping a cup of coffee, lost in her thoughts. She only had been with the boy for the past four hours and she felt his absence. She could only guess how he must felt. On one hand she felt the same, lost, he was now alone in a painful world. On the other hand, she felt relieved because now Carl Roth could not hurt Junior. He would not felt the pain caused by a belt or fists on his flesh.

She was mad at Catherine for agreeing with Miss Watson to take care of the boy. She knew the procedure and that made her heart ache in pain, because now that little boy was going to put up with the system, going from house to house, with bureaucrats directing his life until he would turn eighteen. But there could be a possibility. He could go through all of these and be a good man in the future. He could be one of the luckiest.

Catherine entered the break room and saw Sara seated. Her back was facing her. She seemed lost in her thoughts. She was going to take a break. The 'battle' with Miranda Watson left her exhausted and she needed some caffeine in her system. She poured herself a cup of coffee and took a sip. The brunette didn't notice her presence and that gave her the opportunity to study her.

There were bags under her eyes. Her posture was defeated as if she had lost a precious thing. She knew that the departure of the boy had affected her in more ways than Sara was willing to admit. She had been witness of the pain in her co-worker's eyes, hearing the cries of the boy It affected Catherine too. The boy was attached to Sara there was no doubt about that. She had tried to reason to him, soothing words to calm him, but it was futile. They had a connection and now it was broken.

"Stop staring me, Catherine" Sara had spoken to her, but her voice was distant, cold and tired.

She was so sure that the brunette didn't acknowledge her presence, but like many other things about Sara she was wrong.

"You look tired." She said taking a seat in front of her co-worker. Sara didn't answer to her. She just kept her gaze into space. "Warrick went home, you should do the same".

"I'm waiting for some results" She said absently not looking at Catherine.

Silence set between the two women. Catherine was concerned. She saw Sara too involved in so many cases, especially cases that imply abused women or children. Everybody had issues, but she didn't know what were Sara's. She suspected that something terrible had happened to her, but she didn't dare to ask her. Being the private person she was, Catherine knew that Sara wouldn't tell her. They weren't on the best terms, but she wanted to change that.

"The results can wait. Tomorrow they will be there waiting for you" Catherine said softly.

Sara looked at her. She was so tired. She had been working for hours but it wasn't like any other days. She was emotionally exhausted. Since Brass and her had found the boy, memories were haunting her. Memories she didn't want to relive. They were painful, sad and distressing. But Catherine was right, she needed to rest.

"What about you? You should be with your daughter"

Catherine smiled at her. "I need to finish some paper work and then I'll go home" She made a pause. "Go home, Sara, you need to rest"

She thought about it for a moment, studying Catherine's face. She was tired too. If Catherine was sending her home, she could convince her to go home as well. She needed to spend more time with her daughter. Family was important even her knew it. She didn't want Catherine to waste a chance to be with her daughter.

"Only if you go home too."

Catherine considered it. It was fair, she hadn't spent much time with Lindsey and she was tired too. '_Paper work could wait until tomorrow'_ she thought to herself.

"Deal" She said smiling to the brunette.

They were watching to each other, waiting to see who would make the first move. There was something in Sara's eyes that kept Catherine still. Neither of them were moving. Sara took another sip of her coffee never leaving Catherine's eyes.

"You're not moving" She said. Her cup covering a smile on her lips.

"Neither are you" The blonde challenged, half serious, half joking.

A couple of minutes passed and they were still on the same posture. A phone rang. It was Catherine's. She broke the gaze with Sara and stared at the caller id. It was her mother. Rolling her eyes she leaved it on the table.

"Are you going to answer?" Sara said to her

"It's my mother…whatever she had to say it won't be important." Catherine said with a gesture of dismissal. "She only calls to know when I'm going to be at home and to remember me that I'm an awful mother" This was said with a concealed hurt.

"Well, in that case, you should go home."

Catherine finally picked up her phone and began a discussion with her mother as she expected. She always was arguing with her. Everything she did was wrong to her mother and that pissed her off.

Sara stood up and began to pick up her belongs. She didn't need to heard the conversation between Catherine and her mother.

She was surprised when Catherine closed her phone so quickly. When she looked at her, could sense the sadness that invaded Catherine. It wasn't easy for a single mother to bring up a teenager, even less when your mother was reprimanded you.

"As you suggested I'm going home. Shift is over" She said with a smirk and pointing to her watch.

Catherine contemplated Sara's departure, when suddenly she stopped at the door and turned to her. She was going to say something, but could not find the words. Finally, she directed a shy look at her.

"You are a good mother Catherine. Don't let other people tell you quite the opposite."

Catherine stared at her in surprise. She didn't expect such words from Sara. A smile appeared on her face. She was going to tell her something but the brunette had disappeared in a matter of seconds, leaving her wondering, why Sara had said that.

_Definitely Sara is a box full of surprises_. She thought to herself.

It was time for her to go home and be with her daughter for some time, and rest. She had the impression that tomorrow it would be another exhausted day.

TBC


	14. Rewind

**AN:** Thank you all of you for the reviews. A thak you SoFrost for been my beta. I don't know what I do without your suggestions and corrections.

Pole, I hope you like this chapter, maybe you could understand Sara's reaction to the loss of the boy.

Reviews are always welcome

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**_Chapter 13 - Rewind_**

The smell of copper in the air, the stickiness on her face, on her hands, the wetness of her clothes. There was silence surrounded her. People were moving in slow motion around her, but she didn't care, her eyes were fixed in her hands, in her bloody hands. She could see how they lift the body in a stretcher. A body covered in a black bag.

Bright, blue and red lights bouncing on the fog that surrounded the street. She could see her mother entering in the back of a police car. She didn't look at her, until she was inside of the car. Her mother was searching for her with calm until brown eyes met brown eyes. She could sense the serenity and relief in those eyes. A figure blocked her vision, but she continued to gaze where her mother it was suppose to be, in the car. The man was speaking to her, but she didn't heard his voice, it sounded so far and yet, he was so close. She could taste his breath, there was sourness in it, like hers. He was trying to capture her attention, but she was still looking at her mother through him

It was supposed to be a special night, but all ended the wrong way. She only could repeat in her mind _'It was my fault, it was my fault' _over an over again. She didn't know that she was repeating those words out loud. Something covered her shoulders. It was rough, but she didn't move or cared. Something caught her attention. The man was still speaking to her. She tried to focus on his lips. _'It wasn't your fault kiddo'_ He was saying and then all of a sudden, all the noises came to her. She heard the people that surrounded her, she heard the sirens, people talking to radios. She could feel people watching her and whispering in the ears of the person who was next to them. She tried to cover her ears, but couldn't move, so she tried to focus on the voice of the man. It was like a whisper, it cost her a lot of concentration, but she could heard him say over and over and again _'It wasn't your fault'_.

He kneeled in front of her and took her hand, a hand that she couldn't let it go. He didn't care if there was blood in there. The man didn't block at all the view of the car where her mother was, so she looked at it one more time. She was still watching her. The same feelings were there, but there was something else: pride.

Sara woke up covered in sweat. She was cold and she could feel the bile in her mouth. She suppressed the reaching that was forming in her throat. At first, she didn't know where she was until her eyes got used to the light that entered through the window of her bedroom. She was in her apartment, she was safe. She got up from the bed and went to the kitchen to take something to drink. She opened the door of the fridge and saw the pack of beers she bought in her way home. She stood there staring at the bottles; her hand raised to them, but at the last moment went to the pack of milk that was next to it. It was too early for a drink, despite the fact that the nightmare made her want to swallow the bitter liquor.

She drank the milk and let the empty glass on the hostess bar. The remains of the nightmare were still there. She looked at her hands, she could see the blood there, so she went to the bathroom and washed her hands, brushing them with force. It didn't go away, so she kept brushing and brushing until she was satisfied. Her hands were red now, but there wasn't any blood, and neither before, but she felt the need of brushing the dream away from her. There was only one thing that could keep her busy and that was work. It was too early for work, but she was always early.

After a hot shower, she dressed up in her work clothes and went to the lab. She wanted to check on the results of the day before. Between Junior and the videotape she didn't check the bottles of beer for prints, neither the child's underwear that she had found under the sofa of Carl's apartment. She decided to start with that. She put the ALS on, and inspected the underwear. It became negative to semen. That didn't make her feel better, because she didn't know if that underwear belong to Junior or another child, a possible victim of Carl Roth but at least it wasn't semen there.

Catherine had decided to come early to work too. She needed to do some paperwork before the meeting, besides when she woke up her mother was ready for a fight with her because of Lindsey and how her work consumed her time, time that she needed to spent with her daughter. Catherine knew that her mother was right, but not in the way she was telling her. She always made her feel like a little child.

She arrived to the parking lot of the Crime Lab and parked her car. In her way to the elevators, she saw Sara's car. That brought a smile to her lips. Sara was a well-known workaholic and this case was not an exception. She always worked hard with this kind of cases, and if there was domestic violence, she took it like something personal.

She passed through the different labs, watching as the technicians worked. Henry saw her and called her to enter his Lab, waving a paper.

"Hi Catherine, I have the tox results from your vic" He said enthusiastic. "There was some substance in her blood, Scopolamine"

"Scopolamine? The '_date rape drug'?_" She said taking the sheet from his hands and furrowing.

"Yes, also known as hyoscine. It's a substance extracted from plants in the belladonna family. It's used to treat motion sickness, but in high doses acts as a sedative and a truth serum, in other doses can cause amnesia, dissociation…"

"Yeah, I know the effects. How much was in his system?" She said cutting the lab tech.

"Enough to knock him off. I also found traces in one of the beer bottles that Sara brought me, combined with alcohol it could increase the sedatives effects"

"Thanks, Henry" She said leaving the lab without looking him, reading the tox result.

"Anytime"

She went to her office and began to revise the paper work accumulated on her desk. She tried to concentrate on the file on her hands, but couldn't think in nothing but the tox report. Something wasn't right. The _'date rape drug'_ it was commonly used in rapes, hence its name, but Carl hadn't been raped. She thought about Betty Wilson.

Pulling apart the file that she was reading, she searched on the data base for Betty Wilson's file. When she was raped, there wasn't any indication of the use of the drug. She remembered that Betty had identified him. That piece of information brought to tjink that whoever abducted Carl had to be close to him to put the drug in his beer. Maybe the woman that Junior had mentioned had anything to do with that.

Time passed and she was still working on the reports that were accumulated on her desk. A knock on her door caught her attention. It was Sara. Tiredness was written on her face. She was holding a file in her right hand and a cup of coffee on the other one.

"I think you could use a cup of coffee." Sara said putting the Styrofoam cup on the desk and sitting in one of the chairs in front of Catherine.

"Thanks" She said taking the cup and giving a swig "God, I needed it" She leaned in the chair and closed her eyes savoring the bitter liquid. When she opened her eyes she saw Sara who was watching her with a funny smile on her lips.

"What?" She asked intrigued.

That caught Sara out off ward. She snapped herself from wherever she was and entered in work mode. Clearing her throat, she looked at the file in her hands, avoiding Catherine's gaze.

"I went to Wendy for the DNA results" She said passing a sheet to Catherine who examined it. "There are a female contribution from one of the bottles I found in the vic's apartment, there is also a match with the epithelial cells on one of the condoms and the vaginal contributions on the bed"

"Two female contributions? So there were two women with him. Do we have a name?"

"Not yet, but I printed the bottles and Mandy got a hit" Sara said looking at the file "Ann Polley. She was arrested after the police found her with a client near the strip seven years ago. She also was condemned for possession of heroine. Released from jail five years ago"

"Ok, so we have a hooker and a rapist" Catherine chuckle "What a couple!".

"Maybe she is the woman that Jun…the boy saw with her father and his captor" She said looking up from the file to Catherine. It was said quickly, like the mention of the boy was an issue.

"It's a possibility" Catherine said knowing that Sara would be in trouble again if she'd see the boy again. She didn't know what happened to Sara to react the way she did. The woman was a mystery in itself. "But we still don't know who the other woman was"

"Henry gave me the results of the tox analysis. There was Scopolamine in Carl's blood, and in one of the bottles of beer."

"The '_date rape drug'_." Sara commented furrowing her browns. "That could explain how they knocked him out"

"I think we need to bring Miss Polley to the station. I'll talk to Brass." Catherine said "After interviewing her, we could go to talk to father Silecio to confirm Mr. Wilson's alibi"

"Where's Warrick?"

"Warrick had court, so we can't count on him for today. We are on our own, now" She said smiling to the woman who was standing up from her seat.

Sara looked at her smiling shyly "You know what they said: two sharp women are better than one"

TBC


	15. What she said

**AN: Pole** you need to watch more CSI. There's a specific episode where you could find that information. Season 5 Chapter 13 - Nesting Dolls. Sara confess to Grissom that her mother killed her father. Nothing else. The rest is my imagination.

**Franz** be more patient. The best is to arrive.

**FloatingMoon **I try my best to do it as natural as it can be. Keep reading there would be more.

And for the rest, thank you for reading. We are nearly at the end of this case, well, part of it. :-)**  
**

Reviews are always welcome.

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**_Chapter 14 – What she said _**

Ann Polley was one of those people who frequent the strip in search of a good client. She was dressed with a short skirt and a top with a very low neckline that let you see a great part of her breasts. She had long legs covered by grill tights. Her walk was firm, swinging her hips from one side to the other. Her heels were resonating sharply through the corridors of the police station.

She had a pretty face, like a teenager who hadn't become an adult but was at one step to become it. No one could say that she was in her thirties. When she passed through the different rooms of the police station, the men turned their heads towards her, whistling and whispering sentences of approval. She only smiled seductively and, every so often, she winked at them. She knew how to captive men. She was after all a professional.

Brass was walking beside her with a poker face. He directed her to one of the interview rooms and pointed to the chair behind the table as a silent order to take a seat. She did as she was told and crossed her legs. There was a smile playing on her lips, like she found everything funny. Brass stood still and waited for Catherine and Sara to enter the room.

Catherine was the first one to come in, followed closely by Sara. Both of them took a seat in front of Ann Polley. She was looking at them waiting patiently. Her eyes traveled between the two of them, then they fixed on Brass who was now resting against the wall.

"Do you know why you are here?" It was Brass who spoke first.

"I suppose that it's for something I did" She said looking at Brass and letting her tongue wet her lips. Her voice was sensual, letting the words slip in a whisper. Brass, moved uncomfortable. His eyes fixed on the lips of the woman.

"The name of Carl Roth is familiar to you?" That sifted her attention to the blonde in front of her.

"Yes" She made a pause and her eyes went absent for a moment, like she was remembering. "We had good moments." She said playing with her red hair, her smile never fading away.

"What kind of relationship do you had?"

Her smile went wider "The kind of relationship that a woman and a man have"

"Could you elaborate?" Catherine was losing her patience.

"What? Do you want me to make a diagram? We had sex, drink some beers, and then more sex, hard sex."

"When was the last time you saw him?"

"I don't know" She waved her hand in a dismissive gesture. "Three days, maybe." She waited for the others to say something. The blonde took notes of a file on the table, meanwhile the brunette didn't stop staring her.

"What are you looking at?" She asked "Do you like what you see?" She said with a mischievous smile on her lips. Something in the eyes of the brunette made her smile fade away. Her face was a mask, her lips where a thin line, she couldn't know where the upper lip began and the bottom lip end. There was a strange calmness emanating from her.

"Why are you asking me questions about Carl? Knowing him, he had to be on a good mess" She said laughing.

"He is dead and it seems that the last person who saw him was you" Catherine said flatly. "And we found your fingerprints on a bottle of beer in his apartment"

"That's nothing unusual. Carl and I drank a beer the last time we saw." She said in her defense.

"Maybe, but what it's unusual is the fact that his bottle had an important dose of Scopolamine, the 'date rape drug'. Enough to knock him off"

Ann looked at them in disbelief. She didn't smile now, she was nervous. Something wasn't right. She thought about her possibilities of getting out of whatever happened to Carl.

"I want a lawyer" was her first response after the bomb that Catherine had dropped.

Brass moved from his spot and approached to the woman. He rested his hands on the table and looked at her on the eye.

"You can have your lawyer but it would be wiser to tell us what we want to know, so far we can talk about charging you for murder." His tone was grave leaving any option of discuss.

"What? I didn't kill anyone!" she was nervous, she was starting to loose her composure. "When I left the apartment he was in good state. She was taking care of him"

"She?" Catherine asked arching her eyebrowns. She looked at Sara who hadn't spoke a word since the beginning of the interview.

Ann fell on silence and began to bite her fingernails.

"Start talking or your going to pay for this with jail" Brass commanded her speaking louder. That made her jump.

"Okay" She sighed in surrender "He and I met three days ago at his apartment. We had a drink and sex. Before I left Carl's apartment, he received a called and a few moments later a girl knocked at the door. Carl opened and they seem like they already knew. I don't like to make trios so I took my money and left the apartment"

"You know…I like this story…to bad I don't believe you" Brass said sarcastically.

"I'm telling you the truth!" She spouted.

"So you're telling me that there was a girl, after you left the apartment"

"That's it!" She looked at the three of them "You're not gonna blame Carl's death on me!"

"What was she like?" Brass asked,

"I don't know, blonde hair with a pretty face. Green eyes. She was dressed with a t-shirt and jeans. That's all I can remember"

"We need your DNA to confirm your story or at least part of it" Catherine said taking a swab, ready to take a sample.

"Ah ah" She said shaking her head as a negative "First I want a lawyer"

"If you have nothing to hide that shouldn't be necessary" Brass said coldness.

She sighed and opened her mouth. Catherine ran the sawb through the inside of her cheek, pulled it out and closed it.

"What about the boy?" It was the first time Sara spoke. Her voice was flat. There wasn't any emotion on it. Her face was a mask.

"What boy? You mean that stupid little brat?" Ann questioned with repulsiveness.

"Yeah, that one" Sara said in a whisper trying to hide the rage that was building up.

"I don't know anything about him. When I was with Carl he stayed watching the TV with those stupid cartoons"

"You missed Carl for three days and didn't check up on him?"

"It wasn't my problem. I'm not her mother and even if I was I wouldn't care about him. He's only a snotty, that the only thing that did was disturb."

Brass and Catherine could see how Sara's face turned red with angrier. She was going to say something when Catherine spoke.

"Ok, that's enough" Directing her to Brass she added "Brass, why don't you lead Ms. Polley to a phone so she can make that call to her lawyer"

When Brass and the hooker left the room, Catherine tuned to look at Sara. She was with her arms crossed over her chest, looking at the spot left by the woman.

"What are you thinking?"

"That either she is a liar, which is a huge possibility or she is telling the truth. When I was at the apartment there wasn't any evidence of a third person"

"Neither of a boy" Catherine remarked. That won her one of Sara's cold glare.

"But now we have her DNA that we can compare to the samples on the condoms and see if there is a match" Catherine said showing her the sample.

"I'm going to see if Archie could extract something from the phone I found." Sara stood up "If he received a call it has to be in there"

TBC


	16. Funeral

**AN:**Reviews are always welcome. Enjoy the chapter. The two next chapters are going to be full of answers

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**_Chapter 15 – Funeral _**

"I thought you could make miracles." Sara said to Archie who was trying to access to Carl Roth's phone records.

"I can make miracles, but not with things that have been erased" He said taking the cellular in his hand.

"So you can't extract anything from the phone" It was more a statement than a question to Archie.

The Lab tech was frustrated. He had tried to extract all the information from the phone, but somebody managed to erase all registries, entries calls, outgoings calls, text messages, everything.

"I'm sorry Sara" He said with a defeated voice.

She put a hand on his shoulder "Don't worry about that, we still can ask for a warrant and take the PSP records"

Heading to Catherine's office, she took her phone and called Brass to ask for a warrant. When she arrived at Catherine's office she saw the door open. She entered and closed her phone.

"Hi" She said to the blonde woman who was seated in a chair taping on her laptop.

"Hi" Catherine said without looking at her. "Did you get something from the phone?"

"No. Archie said that someone erased all the information. I asked Brass to get a warrant to see all the phone calls he made. I think that if he knew that girl Ann described, they would have some kind of connection. Maybe he called her sometime."

Catherine reclined in her chair. "So we are back to square one. Let's hope Wendy will have something when we return from paying a visit to Father Silecio"

"Are you ready to leave?" Sara asked to Catherine

"Yeah, give me minute and I'll be ready"

"Okay, I'll wait for you in the car" Sara said leaving Catherine alone in her office.

Sara was waiting in the car for Catherine, when she spotted her heading to where she was, talking agitatedly over the phone. She took her time to study her and admired her. Catherine was a beautiful woman, prove of that was all the looks that men glance at her at every turn. She had something that made you want to be close to her, to touch her, but at the same time to keep a distance. She used her body language as a weapon to attract people to her. She could turn on a man in a matter of seconds, and not only men. Sara thought to herself that Catherine Willows used her sexuality as a double-edge weapon. She told her once, but that brought them to a fight. That was also because at the time she hadn't put the form in her comment, she had been less than diplomatic to say the least. She was sick of arguing with her, she cared for the woman more than she ever let her know.

She watched her closely as she made her way to the car, swinging her hips. She watched her legs, firm legs. Her walk was decided but at the same time very feminine. She was wearing sunglasses that hide her beautiful blue eyes. Sara was always lost in those eyes.

When Catherine reached the car, Sara snapped her head to the front, and started the engine. Catherine was still talking over her phone.

"Look, I don't want to talk about it right now, Lindsey" She said firmly.

Sara started to drive off from the parking lot.

"I said NO and that's my final response!" There was a pause and Sara glace at Catherine, just in time to see her put a stray lock of her blonde hair right behind her ear. "I don't care what other parents do with their children. I'm your mother and I said NO"

After a moment of listening to her daughter, Catherine was going to lose her temper. "I'll talk to you later, but what I said still remains" She closed her phone and sighed.

Sara kept focusing on the driving. For her part, Catherine had slid her sunglasses over her eyes and was watching the traffic of Las Vegas, her head resting in her hand.

"Are you okay?"

There was silence, until Sara tried again. She took the opportunity of a red light to turn to her co-worker.

"Cath" Sara put a hand on Catherine's arm to attract her attention. She turned her head and Sara could see hurt and sorrow in her eyes. "Are you okay?" She asked gentle

"Yeah, don't worry"

"If I'm not worried about you, who's gonna look after you?" She said with a wink, turning her attention to the road and putting the hand that had been resting in Catherine's arm on the steering wheel.

Catherine looked at her surprised. Sara had a shadow of a smile on her lips. Catherine could observe that she had strong arms, not the strong ones where every muscle was marked, but the gentle, fibrous. She watched her a few moments. She wander how was to feel be in those arms, because right now she needed some comfort.

"And who's looking after you?" She asked. Her voice was just above a whisper.

Sara smiled, one of her grin smiles, almost shy, mysterious. She didn't respond to Catherine's question.

After a long pause, Catherine gave up and turned her face to the road. They were almost at the direction that Owen Wilson gave her.

Sara turned the car to the right heading Smoke Ranch Rd. and parked in front of the church. There were a few people outside. Most of them were young people, ages between twenty and thirty-five. Each one of them had their scuba materials, piled up near a van.

Catherine and Sara step out of the SUV, and headed to the group.

"Excuse me" Catherine said to the group. A man in his thirties turned to her and smile.

"Hello" He said looking at her from toes to head "What can I do for you sunshine?"

Catherine smiled to him. "We are looking for Father Silecio. Do you know where we can find him?"

"He is at the church saying a funeral." He said still smiling to Catherine and checking her over.

"Who died?" Sara asked turning the attention of the man to her.

"Sabina Kitsch, one of the volunteers of the church" He said still glancing at Catherine.

"Did you know her?" Catherine asked.

"Not too much. She was a good girl, but we weren't closer, if you know what I mean." He said arching her eye browns, his smile never fading away.

"What happened to her?" Catherine asked.

"Car accident" His face turned serious. "She collide with a wall. Police thinks that maybe she lost control of the car"

"Thank you, Mr…."

"Gordon, Ron Gordon" He said rising his hand in a greeting way. "and what's yours, pretty ladies?"

"Crime Lab" Sara said to him flatly "Now if you'll excuse us" She said passing through him and heading to the entrance of the church.

Catherine was watching her like she had two heads. She left Ron Gordon behind and followed Sara, but first she apologized to Mr. Gordon with her best smile. Once she was at Sara's level she grasped Sara's arm.

"What's wrong with you?" She demanded. She didn't understand the change of mood in Sara.

"Nothing is wrong with me" Sara said to her, pulling apart.

"And what was that about?"

"How can you flirt with him in the middle of an investigation?"

"What? I didn't flirt with him, I was polite"

"Yeah, whatever." She said entering in the church.

The Church was nothing like Vegas. There was no neon bars, neither showy signs. It was very austere and simple. There was silence when they entered. A few people turned their heads towards them, but rapidly they turned back to the altar. Most of them where in deep thought. They were silently praying for the girl who had died. Catherine and Sara took a seat at the end of the church and waited for the end of the funeral. At the presbytery, there was a coffin, just in front of the altar. Next to that coffin, there was a photograph, but neither Catherine nor Sara couldn't see the figure that was represented there.

Catherine and Sara took the opportunity to watch the people that were congregate. They were together at the front. Everyone had their heads nearly touching their chest, some of them were moving their lips, saying a silent prayer. At the end of the church, near the lectern, seated in a chair, was Father Silecio. Catherine recognized him from the photograph at Owen Wilson's house.

After a few moments of intense silence, Father Silecio stood up and approached to the lectern. His pose was stoic. He had a powerful presence. His movements were slow, taking his time, to open the book that was lying on the lectern. He scrutinized the people that were in front of him. He had a charisma that a few people had.

When he spoke, his voice was so powerful that made Catherine arched her spine. She turned to Sara. She was frowning in concentration and her lips were a thin line. Both women sensed a chill run their spine when their ears picked up at the words that father Silecio pronounced.

"Our bodies are prisons for our souls"

TBC

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**AN:** Sorry for let you with a cliffhanger. I couldn't avoid it and it was time to do it ;-) 


	17. The Headmaster Ritual

**AN: **This is a reminder for all the people who thinks (and they are right) that my grammar sucks. I'm still Spanish and english is not my mother tongue. You have the option to read the story or not to read it. It's your choice, so if you want to continue reading go ahead. I'll be grateful for that. If you stop reading, it will be a shame. I'm not perfect.

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**_Chapter 16 – The Headmaster Ritual _**

"Our bodies are prisons for our souls"

The words that Father Silecio had pronounced, kept replaying in Catherine's ears. She had seen the body and the thin yet deep lines that formed that sentence in Carl Roth's chest and now that image returned to her like a blow on her head. She looked at Sara who was in the same position as before. Her lips pressed together, her eyebrows in a frown.

"Gotcha" She said most to herself than to Catherine.

Catherine approached to her and whispered in her ear that she was going to dial Brass and ordered her to keep and eye on the priest. Sara only nodded still looking at the lectern where Father Silecio carried on with his sermon. Little did he know that after the funeral, Brass and a couple of officers would be waiting for him to drive him outside of the Church.

The ride was short. They had had a few problems when it came to put Father Silecio in a police car. People were staring at them with rancor and at the same time in disbelief. In one hand they considered Father Silecio as an example to be followed, in the other hand people couldn't believe that he was taken by the police to be questioned. The only people who believed and trusted completely him were the group that Catherine saw on the photograph at Owen Wilson's house, but the group was three people short. One of them was Betty Wilson, the other one was Father Silecio, and the last one was Sabina Kestch. Now she could put a face to the person who lied on the coffin.

Father Silecio didn't protest at all when they led him to the police car. He only remarked that he needed to be at the funeral, but the ceremony was over and the only thing that was left to do, was put the coffin six feet under.

He wasn't surprised when he was taken in an interrogation room. He just waited for the two women to make an appearance. He looked like a man of firm hand. He had black hair with a few grey hair above his ears. His grey eyes were cold, didn't express any emotion, but you could say by his posture that he was an authoritative man.

Catherine and Sara both took a seat in front of Father Silecio.

"Do you mind if I record this session?" It was Sara who broke the silence first, challenging him with her eyes, meanwhile she extracted a tape recorder not bigger than her hand.

"I don't have any objection. Go ahead" He said with a gesture of his hand.

"Father Silecio, just for the record, what are your functions in St. Thomas Church?" Catherine asked

"I'm the priest in charge of the church. The typical activities for a priest, and organize certain activities" His voice was calm, peaceful, almost hypnotic.

"What kind of activities?"

"Activities like rehabilitation of people who had been in jail, people who had to fight to recover from their drug addiction. We are a center of rehabilitation."

"How did you do that? Do you have specialists in that area, like doctors or nurses?"

"Yes and no"

"Could you elaborate?"

"Yes of course. We had volunteers that help us. They could be doctors or nurses, psychologists… but mostly we try to help them through the faith. We have a group which goal is to integrate people with problems into society."

"Is Owen Wilson one of the people of the group of rehabilitation?"

"Yes, he is one of our most fervent volunteers"

"Was Betty Wilson one of them too?" Sara asked him. Maybe if she talked about Betty she would provoke a reaction in Father Silecio's attitude.

He looked at her during a few moments. There was something in his eyes that Sara couldn't put a name on. Hurt, maybe.

"Yes, she was" He looked to the right. "She was an excellent person. Her death stunned to all of us". His tone was distant, giving the impression that he didn't want to remember.

"Did you know Carl Roth?" she asked. He took his time to respond. Slowly he turned his head to the brunette. His eyes were cold again, and his grip to the table made his knuckles turn white.

"Yes I knew him. He was one of the persons we tried to help, that Betty tried to help." His tone was harsh.

"Father Silecio, where were you two days ago?" Brass asked

"I was with the group preparing an excursion to Lake Mead. We where checking our scuba materials and forming the new group that would join us," he said turning his attention to the detective

"Owen Wilson was with you?"

"No, he wasn't, but I had lunch with him that day, like the rest of the group".

"Honesty is always worthy of praise, even though does not report utility, neither compensates, nor benefit" Sara said staring at him. "Do you know these words?"

He marked a pause before answering to Sara's question. A smile formed on his lips, a sadistic one. His eyes darkened.

" Cicero" After a few seconds he looked at the three persons that where in the room "Is this some kind of test?"

"Our bodies are prisons for our soul" Sara added. "What does it mean to you?"

_"There it goes now it's nothing or everything"_ Catherine thought to herself. She could see that Sara was taking the opportunity to make him flinch or get something from him that would lead them to a real suspect.

He looked at her, still smiling. "It means that our skin and blood, are the iron bars of confinement. All flesh decays. Death turns all to ash. And thus, death frees every soul"

"Did Carl Roth have a soul?"

"Every person in this planet has a soul, even you, Miss Sidle" He said with an understanding smile "Carl was a person that needed help to liberate his soul from his sins. He came to us in search of that help. Later we discovered that he was more interested in Betty than in his soul." He made a pause, studying the table in front of him "I guess he finally found the peace he needed".

"Did you help him to find that peace?"

"Yes, I helped him"

Catherine could sense how Sara's muscles tensed. Sara was indignant, and dared him to gloat at his actions

"Did you torture him for entertainment or to liberate his soul?" Sara asked, leaning forward. He mimicked her position in response.

"I'm only saying that he is now liberated from his sins." He replied calmly and still smiling.

"I'm sure that he was better without your help" Sara realized that she wasn't going to trick him into confessing, and they needed to change tactics.

Before she could speak again, he interrupted her thoughts. "Ms. Sidle, not a believer?

"This has nothing to do with faith, _Father_"

"You can't understand then, that without faith there is no redemption."

"In three parts the human soul is divided: in mind, in wisdom and wrath. I think that the last one was the dominant" she replied firmly

He stayed still, his eyes never leaving hers.

There was a knock on the door of the interrogation room. Brass went there and exchanged a few words with the officer that just came in. A few seconds passed. Finally, Brass turned to them, looking directly to the man who was questioned.

"Father Silecio's attorney is here"

Sara never took her eyes from their suspect "He's not in custody; he's just here to help us answer some questions".

A blonde man entered the room "The group of volunteers where concerned and asked me to make sure there were no problems I needed to know about:"

Catherine looked to Sara. She was in tension. Father Silecio rattled her with his attitude, and she knew that they wouldn't have enough evidence against him to keep him in custody or to accuse him.

"We're through here anyway" Catherine said.

Father Silecio stood up and cleared up his cassock. He looked at the two women that were examining every movement he did. When he started to leave the room, he turned to them one more time, both women were with her backs to him.

"Maybe we could talk about your soul Miss Sidle, I'm sure that it would be interesting."

With that, he abandoned the room, leaving Sara and Catherine alone with Brass.

"I don't think we can catch him with all we have" Catherine said breaking the silence.

"We need more to catch him than what he said." Brass added. "No judge will give us a warrant just by his statement"

Sara leaned forward to the table and took the audio recorder smiling. "No, you're right, but now we have his voice." She said looking at Catherine still smiling and with a look that Catherine had missed in a long time. The sparkle that used to make those chocolate eyes so alive had returned. "Let's compare it to the audio of the videotape". She said showing the tape recorder to them.

TBC


	18. Evidence

Thank you to all of you for your reviews. You don't know the meanning they have to me. I hope you are enjoying the story, because now we are approaching to the beginning of this story.

Special thanks to SoFrost for been my beta and encouraging me to do the best I can.

**_Chapter 17 – Evidence _**

They were in the A/V Lab. Archie was capturing the audio tape on the computer and playing his magic to compare the voice of the videotape to the voice of Sara's recorder. Catherine was watching how Sara was pacing from one side of the room to another, waiting for Archie to make his diagnosis. It was like watch a lion in his cage. It unnerved Catherine so much at some point she needed Sara to stop.

"Sara, stop it!" She said with an edgy voice. Sara stopped dead in her tracks, and looked at her with surprise "You're not doing any good pacing like a wild animal in a cage"

"Blame Archie for been too slow" She said with calmy voice and a smile on her lips

"Hey, don't start there! I'm just trying to do it as quickly as I can, but you are unnerving me. I can't work like this!"

The technician knew that this was crucial for the case, but couldn't avoid the feeling of been watched so close that he could feel them breathing in his neck. He was used to remain calm, and work at his rhythm, but Sara was making it difficult to concentrate. He had to trespass the audio to the computer and put some filters to isolate the voice of the suspect. It was a matter of minutes but the two women were distracting him.

When he finally had the two voices separated in two different channels, he turned to the two women with a smile.

"You two are ready to play?"

Both women nodded in response, expectants to see what Archie had.

"Okay, as you know, in channel one we have the voice from the videotape" He press the table space bar and soon the room was filled with the whispering voice. Once the sequence was completed, he pressed the table space bar again to stop the audio. "On channel two we have the voice from Sara's recorder. I extracted some fragments of the interview, and discard your voices, because obviously…"

"Archie, please" Sara cut him, putting her hands together, to emphasize her words "we know that you're the master here" She was smirking to him, and that made the effect desired in Archie's ego. "But, could you be less specific, and compare the two voices once and for all"

He looked at her. God he loved when people begged him. He smiled at her and looked at Catherine who was massaging her temples. Obviously, she was stressed too.

"Okay, okay"

Three pairs of eyes watched the picks up and down while the two voices resonate at the same time. Once again, the silence set in the room. Sara was looking at Archie expectant, waiting for the final result. Catherine for her part was tired and didn't want to waste more time.

"Archie, please, tell us something." Catherine demanded

"They match" He said seriously.

"Are you sure?" Sara asked with hopeful eyes

"Yes, at least is what the spectrometer is saying. You just need to watch this part" He said marking the lines "There's no doubt in my mind that they are the same voice"

"I knew it! I told you that you can't expect anything good from a man wearing a cassock" Sara said to Catherine "We got him, Cath"

Catherine remained silent while Sara was rambling. She didn't understand why Father Silecio let them evidence of his implication in that crime. There was something off about all of this.

"There's something off" She said aloud. Yet it was almost a whisper.

"What do you mean? We can situate him on the crime scene, he nearly confess that he killed him"

"No, Sara. He admitted he tried to help Carl Roth, not that he killed him"

"But still we can situate him on the crime scene"

There was a tensed pause. Sara was looking at Catherine. The blonde was thinking, she had a stare in her eyes that made Sara nervous, like she didn't want to believe that they had a real suspect on this investigation.

"Archie, are you sure that the voice from the videotape is not a recorder?" Catherine asked to the technician. She knew that her question would upset Sara, but she had to know, she needed to be sure that they were doing right.

"What??" Sara asked to Catherine not believing what she was saying.

Archie found himself between the two women. He stared at the two of them. "I can't verify that, but it could be a possibility"

"What?" Sara asked again, this time to Archie

"I mean, it's like a whisper, if someone tried to accuse to that man, it's possible that he recorder one of his sermons and play it, but it's difficult to say it."

"Catherine, you saw him in that room, he was tricking us. He is the one responsible for the death of Carl Roth." Now she was furious. They almost had a confession from the priest and his voice was in the video tape that they found hanging on the neck of a dead body. "We have his voice and a motive, revenge"

"Yeah, it's a possibility, but still we have one voice that we can't identify."

"That's true, but the question is that we had a real suspect now. We can ask for a warrant to his house and his parish church to search for evidence against him"

"You know very well, that if we don't find anything that proves that he is the killer, we need to let him go and if we accuse him of this murder and results that he is innocent…"

"Yeah I know."

"We need to be careful, Sara, and not let our feelings or presentiments cloud our judgments"

"We are here only to process evidence, remember?" The brunette said to her flatly arching and eyebrow.

Catherine looked at her. That sentence didn't pass over her. There was something about that man that she didn't like. Sara was right, he almost confessed killing Carl Roth, but what bother her most, was the fact that he had put an eye on Sara. The last sentence made her flinch. Of course, it could be nothing, and it was like Sara didn't care at all. She was too focused on caching that man that she didn't think about the consequences if they couldn't prove that he was the murderer or that he was a fundamental piece in this case.

"Why are you looking at me like that?" Sara asked concerned.

"Because…" She stopped before she said anything that could be misunderstanding. She took Sara by the arm and dragged her to her office. She didn't want Archie to listen what she had thought.

"Catherine, you're scaring me. What is this about?" She said, still not understanding what had happened to her co-worker to act like this.

She needed to clear her head, and think clearly. She couldn't let her feelings cloud her reason. But honesty was better, so she leaned on her desk and looked at the brunette. Concern was over her face.

"What did he say before leaving the interview room?" She thought that maybe if she could guide Sara to the same conclusion that she arrived to, the brunette would be less defensive.

At first, Sara stared at her like she was crazy. When she remembered the words father Silecio had pronounced, understanding set on her. She looked at her in disbelief.

"Cath, are you trying to say me that if we don't catch him, I'm going to be his next victim?" She couldn't suppress the smirk in her face.

"What do you find so funny?" The blonde asked in a serious tone. "It wouldn't be the first time that we are the tarjet of a psychopath"

"You know, you are really funny. We don't have motive to suspect that, and if that was the case, I could handle it"

"You don't know how it is like" She said still remembering Howard Delhomme.

Sara watched how Catherine distanced from her. She put a hand in her arm.

"Catherine I think you are overreacting" She said in a soft tone.

"Maybe you are right. It's just that I don't like the way he acted. He's hiding something, and that unnerves me"

It wasn't too difficult to convince a judge for a warrant and the next day, Catherine, Sara and Warrick were at the door of the parish church with Brass and a couple of officers.

Father Silecio greeted them and when he saw Sara he smiled.

"Miss Sidle, I was wondering when we would meet again"

"Father Silecio, we had a warrant for the parish and the church" Brass said to him pushing Sara aside and showing him the paper. "If you would do us the favor to step out" He said with a gesture of his arm.

He looked at Brass and step out of the parish, taking the warrant to read it.

Catherine, Warrick and Sara entered the parish. It was divided in two floors. The first floor was a reception with a few doors, one of them lead to the church, another one, lead to a storeroom, and the last lead to the basement.

The second floor led to the office of the priest and the rooms.

"I'll take upstairs" Sara said heading to the stairs

"Warrick, why don't you take the first floor. I'll be in the church" Catherine

"Okay"

Catherine scanned the church with her eyes. There wasn't any coffin or photography that reminded her of the funeral, only a few flowers and some candles burning. There was silence in there. She looked at the benches remembering the people that were seated there the day before. The sadness was still palpable in the air or maybe it was just her imagination. She couldn't tell at all.

With nothing she met Warrick at the storeroom. He was bagging something, ropes. There were a few accessories for scuba driving and mountain climbing. In a corner there were a few boxes heaped up.

"What did you find? Catherine asked him

He looked at her startled. "I just got a few ropes. I'll compare them with the ones that tied up the body's victim." He said to her finishing bagging the ropes.

"What's in the boxes?" She asked pointing with her torch

"They are some programs. I'll take a few if you want"

"Yes, take some of them." After a pause, she added "I'm going to see how Sara is doing. Call me if you need anything"

"Don't worry, I'll do it"

Catherine took the stairs that lead to the second floor. Once she arrive at the top she could see a corridor with two doors at the left and one on the right. At the end of the corridor there was a window that offered a view of a little garden on the backyard of the parish.

The door of the left was open so she went there. She found Sara studying a book that was on the desk. Certainly this was the priest office. Shelves full of books decorated the walls of the office. There was a window behind the desk, and the light slip through it.

She contemplated the brunette while she was reading. She was concentrated, her full attention on that book, that she didn't notice Catherine standing at the door frame.

After a few seconds, Catherine cleared her throat "What are you looking at?"

Sara looked at her in surprise. "Geez Cath, you're scared me"

"Sorry, it wasn't my intention" She responded to her with a playfully smile. "You were deep in thought when I arrived"

"Yeah, well, I was examining this book"

"What is it about?" She asked approaching to the brunette.

"For what I read it's about the penal process of the Inquisition" She said passing different pages. "Look at this: When arriving at a population two edicts were proclaimed, "the edict of faith" forces the faithful, under penalty of excommunication, to denounce to heretic and accomplices, and "the edict of grace", in which the heretic, in a term of fifteen to thirty days, could confess their faults without the perpetual prison nor the capital punishment"

While Sara was reading, Catherine approached to the brunette. Her face inches away from Sara's. She was reading as well looking above Sara's shoulder.

Sara continued reading, sensing the proximity of Catherine's body. She tensed a little, but she carried on the lecture. "This caused multiple denunciations, protected by the anonymity. The denounced ones did not know in any moment what they were accused of"

She ended the text and looked over her shoulder to Catherine. She was still leaning on Sara's body, her palm resting on the back of the brunette. When she noticed that Sara had stopped reading she turned her head to her and lock her eyes with hers. They looked at each other for a moment. Sara's eyes went to the lips of the blonde.

"Maybe…I should take this…" She said in a whisper.

"Yeah" Was the only answer of the blonde, but she was still in the same posture.

"Ummm, Catherine?"

"Yeah?" She was lost in those chocolate eyes.

"I need to move…could you…?"

"Oh, sorry" She said taking a step back from her blushing a little.

"Don't be sorry for that" Sara said to her with a mysterious smile.

"Did you find something else?" Catherine said trying to regain her composure.

"A few photograph of a group. I think they are from the group of volunteers" Sara was now on work mode. The spell was broken, and Catherine felt the renew distance. "And some videos that I've already bagged"

"Did you check the other rooms?"

"Only the master room. There wasn't anything probative."

"I'm going to check the bathroom" Catherine said exiting quickly from the room.

Once there she looked at her reflection in the mirror. _"What the hell were you thinking?"_ She thought to herself. With a shake of her head she dismissed her thoughts and opened the closet of the bathroom. There were a few medicines in there. She looked at the prescriptions, when one of them took her attention

_Scopolamine._

TBC


	19. Dead End

**AN: **Sorry for the delay, but there was a bet on this chapter and... well I needed to wait for the results. Anyway. Here is the chapter. I hope you like it.

**Chelsee6** don't be sorry for putting a review. I don't mind when you put a review, whereas you put a review :-) And thank you for helping us with the bet.

**Pole** I know you're shocked, but there's a warning posted in the summary.

Anyway thank you all for your reviews, you make my day!

And I can't forget **SoFrost**. Thank you for your encouragement, your corrections, suggestions and for all you can imagine. You're the best!

* * *

**_Chapter 18 – Dead End_**

They examined all the evidences found at the parish. The ropes didn't match the ones used to tie up Carl Roth. There were epithelial cells, but it could be everything or nothing. Warrick knew that everybody had access to the storeroom; that meant that every person of the group of volunteers, including Father Silecio, could have touched the ropes. They knew by the programs and by what the priest had told them that there were activities that justified the use of the ropes. It was a dead end and that frustrated them.

Archie found himself loaded with at least twenty videotapes, with more than three hours recorded. It would be an exhausting shift and the next that would follow it wouldn't be any easier. The videotapes were cataloged by date. So, he started for the most recent date and then went back to the oldest one. It could take days to process all of them but it had to be done if they wanted to catch the killer. He didn't know what he was about to find in there.

"Anything that could be suspicious" Sara had said to him. She had promised him that when she had time she would help him to watch all the tapes, but after that she had disappeared without another word.

He took one video off of the pile and looked at the date in the tape: 05/07. He played it. It was some kind of celebration, a birthday. There were several people around a birthday cake laughing and singing. He didn't know who was the person in the center, but it seemed like people were paying tribute to her. She had blonde hair and a radiant smile. She was attractive and her green eyes were emanating a sparkle that caught his attention.

"She's pretty, isn't she?"

Archie didn't turn to see who had entered the room. He knew very well that voice. He smiled never leaving his eyes from the screen.

"Yeah, she is beautiful"

"She was, Archie. That's Sabina Kestch" Catherine said taking a seat next to him.

"It's a shame. She had something, I don't know, pure?" He said still looking at the screen. Now she was opening her presents. Everyone, except two people was around her, clapping every time she opened one of the presents. Father Silecio was on the screen as Owen Wilson.

Archie forwarded the tape a few minutes. Now the group was making a toast. The first one to speak in the videotape was Father Silecio. He was more relaxed and looked at the young Sabina with sweet eyes.

"For the young ones." He said looking at her. "They are our future and in them we have faith to follow God's steps"

Everybody made the toast. After a little sip, Owen Wilson cleared his throat and talked.

"For the ones that left us" There was an uncomfortable silence. They weren't smiling anymore and Catherine detected that Mr. Wilson was a little drunk. The expression in Father Silecio darkened. He looked at Owen Wilson and signed. Finally he raised his drink and replied to him "For the ones that left us and never came back. May God takes care of them, the same way we are going to take care"

Everybody seemed to relax after the priest's words, and carried on with the party.

The rest of the videotape had nothing interesting. They did games and other things. There wasn't anything really probative except that they were a compact group that provided each other for comfort and happiness. For Catherine, the group looked like a family.

It made Catherine wonder what kind of relationship she had with Nick, Warrick, Greg, Grissom and especially Sara. They were co-workers, that was a fact, but between them there was a connection that was confirmed after Nick's abduction. Now watching the videotape she could see the parallels between St. Thomas Church's group and the CSIs. They didn't celebrate birthdays together, but had a few celebrations on their own. She remembered when Greg passed his exams and became a CSI and a few Christmas parties.

If there was a thing to be sure of, it was that Catherine will do anything for them. She demonstrated it when Grissom was in danger with the 'strip strangle'. She didn't doubt a second before pulling the trigger and kill that bastard to save her friend. But that was a dead or live situation. She knew that when Nick was abducted she wanted to rip the heart of his captor or when her daughter was in danger she was ready to do anything to save her. If Brass had let her be on the front she would have pulled the trigger once more time without any doubt.

She was deep in her own thoughts when an idea came up to her. If they couldn't prove Father Silecio's guiltiness, maybe the clue was in the group. It was a fact that Carl Roth was murdered by at least two men and there was a woman involved. Brass had brought a photography of the group to Ann Polley to identify the mysterious girl that went to Carl's apartment. It turned out to be Sabina Kestch. But now she was dead. The registries of Carl Roth's revealed that he made a few calls to the parish and other ones to the said woman a few days before his death. Now, they only needed to demonstrate that two other persons were involved in his murder, but that was another story.

It was hard to believe that Sabina's death was casual. It was too suspicious. So Catherine had asked Sara to look at the car and processed it. That was a few hours ago and still she hadn't heard anything from the brunette yet.

Another thing that preoccupied Catherine, was Father Silecio and the part he had played in this murder. He was the 'father figure' of the group. They worshipped him, they looked at him for advice, guidance and comfort. They worked for him in the parish. For what they knew, the life of the group was around him. But when they found scopolamine in his bathroom he had an excuse, better to say that his lawyer and his doctor, had an excuse for that.

Father Silecio suffered sea-sickness, and scopolamine it was commonly used by scuba drivers, due to its effectiveness against sea-sickness. That didn't necessarily mean that he had given the pills to Sabina Kestch to drug Carl Roth. The prints that she had found weren't from the priest, so they couldn't prove anything against him except his voice in the tape.

After an hour of looking at the videotapes where Archie and Catherine could see the priest in a scuba skin Catherine decided to take a break and see what Sara had found in the car.

She excused herself and went to the garage in search of Sara. In her way, she made a stop in the break room and took two mugs of coffee. Sara would need one of them. When she was going to leave, Grissom entered the room and called her.

"Catherine, I was looking for you" He said to her never looking away from the sheets he had in his hand.

"What can I do for you?"

"First of all. How is the Roth's case working?" He asked looking above his glasses

"Not very well. We don't have a real suspect and the only one that could be has an alibi, but I'm sure he is involved in a certain way"

"Just concentrate on the evidence, Catherine. What does it tell you?"

"Oh come on, Gil. Are you going to treat me like a rookie?"

"I'm just saying that if you don't have enough evidences to prove that your 'suspect' is 'responsible' for the murder, you need to let him go, and concentrate in other things"

"I know, but the evidence it's contradictory. In one hand we have his voice recorded in a videotape where we can see how a person kills our victim. We had the testimony of a woman that puts one of his 'group of friends' in the apartment of the victim, maybe hours or minutes before his disappearance, but now she is dead"

"Did you investigate the cause of death of that woman?"

"Yeah, it was a car accident. Sara is examining the car to see if it was tricked"

"What about Warrick?"

"Warrick is processing the ropes that we found in the parish, but they don't match the ones used to tied up Carl Roth's body to the planks"

"Good…" He said thinking. Catherine watched him with suspicious eyes.

"Good? What is good for you?"

"I need one of you for a new case. Do you mind if I take Warrick with me?"

"If he has finished with his work I don't see any problem" She said to him.

"Perfect." He started to leave the room when he turned to her.

"And Catherine, if you don't have any proof that leads you to a suspect of the crimes, you need to focus on anything else. We can't always catch the bad guys and put them between bars"

He didn't wait for Catherine's replied. He just said that to her and left the room leaving Catherine with two mugs of cold coffee in her hands.

_'Guys, that's the word'_ she thought to herself. She took a sip of coffee and seeing the bad taste she emptied the mugs in the sink. She poured two fresh cups of coffee and went in search of Sara.

When she entered the garage, the first thing that caught her attention was the wrecked car. A red mustang which front was a mess, a jumble of metal At first sight it was obvious that the accident was a front collision, and according to the report, the car crashed with a wall. It was like the driver had lost control of the car or that she crashed intentionally. Sara was nowhere to be found. She went to the other side of the car when she tripped over something that made half of the coffee end on the floor and the other part of it on her blouse.

There was an immediate reply, and not very pleasant.

"Hey! Watch it! I'm trying to work in here!"

"Shit, Sara! You could put some warning signs or something like that!" Catherine said trying to compose herself and avoiding the pond of coffee that was on the floor.

"Catherine?" She asked surprise

"Who the hell else should I be?" She was pissed. She had a big spot of coffee on her new blouse and her hand hurt from the burning coffee and that pissed her off more.

Sara appeared from below the car and watched with her eyebrows arched.

"You need to watch were you put your foot before walking, you know?" She said in a mocking tone "You could be hurt"

"No kidding" replied the blonde sarcastically. "Now I need to change my clothes"

"Hey don't blame it to me. I was working, you're the one who trip over me."

"Yeah, yeah…" she said trying to clean herself.

After a moment Sara noticed the two cups of coffee on the floor.

"What were you doing with two cups of coffee?" Sara asked to her

Catherine stopped and looked at her. "I brought you a cup of coffee, but I doubt you want to drink it from the floor."

Getting out from under the car, Sara stood up and watched the blonde. The blouse was a mess of coffee and Catherine was applying some pressure on her left hand

"Are you hurt?" She asked pointing Catherine's hand, concern over her face.

"It's nothing, just a little burn" She responded without looking at her.

"Let me see" Sara demanded

"It's nothing, don't worry".

"If it is nothing you wouldn't be applying pressure in there" She said in a soft tone. "Please, let me see"

Catherine uncovered her hand as Sara approached to her to take a look at the burn while she was taking off gloves. She took Catherine's hand in hers and some napkins and started to clean up the remains of coffee carefully.

"Does it hurt?" She asked still cleaning her hand. Catherine watched as she proceeded to take care of her hand. The touch was gentle and smooth. Sara was very careful to not hurt her. In fact, Catherine didn't feel any pain at all but she was willing to pretend, just to feel Sara's touch. She didn't feel her hand burning that much – the sting was light, but she did feel all her body arching for Sara's touch.

Sara stopped cleaning her hand when Catherine didn't answer her question. She looked at her. Catherine was looking how their hands were entwined. There was a comfortable silence between the two women. Catherine looked at her, and then she realized that Sara had spoken and she hadn't given her any answer.

"No, it's fine" She said in a soft tone never leaving the brunette's hazel eyes.

"Good." She said smiling. "Let's put you some cream on that hand"

They left the garage and went to the locker room where there was a medical kit. Sara took the cream and turned to Catherine. She applied the cream over the red mark the burn had left on Catherine's hand. After that, she looked to the blue eyes of the blonde, not letting go of Catherine's hand.

"Now it will heal properly." She said with a bright smile on her lips.

"I don't have any doubt about that, _Doctor Sidle_" Catherine replied with a seductive smile on her lips.

"Well, since I was the one who provoked this" Sara pointed to Catherine's hand, "the less I can do is buying you breakfast."

"I hope you have a spare of clothes, because I don't and I'm not going out like this" She replayed showing the state of her blouse.

Sara smiled "Yeah, don't worry, I have some clothes you can borrow" She said opening her looker and taking out a black t-shirt that she handed to Catherine. She contemplated the mess that was the blouse and signed. "What a pity. It looked good in you"

"Thanks" she said blushing. Silence set once more between the two women. They were watching and neither was moving.

"What did you find in the car?" Catherine decided to break the silence. She felt vulnerable with Sara's stare, like the brunette could see through her. So she decided get her mind on work.

"Nothing. Everything seems to be in a good state, except the front." Her tone was serious and there was a shadow that covered her eyes.

"What's wrong?"

"I've watched the photographs of the scene. There weren't marks of breaks on the road. It's like she collided with the wall intentionally"

"Yeah, that's what I though. I was hoping you could have found something that didn't corroborate that hypothesis"

"Well I'm not done yet, but I could use a break" Sara said. "Let's get us cleaned and have breakfast. The car is not going anywhere for at least the next 24 hours"

While Sara was taking a shower, Catherine's eyes were wandering through Sara's belongings. There were a few photographs on the inside of the door of the looker. One was of a young couple. From what she could see, she would say they were more than fifteen years old. It was obvious that one of the persons in the photograph was Sara – The gap between her front teeth made her unmistakable -who had her arms wrapped around a young boy, maybe seven years older than her. On the background there was the sea. There was something familiar about them. The other photographs were from the group of CSI. They were all smiling at the camera, she remembered this moment, it was during Lindsey's birthday. Another photograph showed another group. She didn't recognize the people that were there, except a smiling Sara, younger than now. _"This one must be from San Francisco"_ Catherine thought to herself. Sara was been teased by a woman who had the remains of a cake in her fingers and from the look of it, it seemed she was trying to put some of that cake in Sara's face. She didn't remember Sara being so happy.

"Did you change?" A voice asked her. She was drying her head with a towel, and didn't seem to notice Catherine watching the photographs.

"Yeah, thank you" She said embarrassed and putting the piece of cloth on.

Sara looked at her a few moments while Catherine was finishing. "It fits you"

Catherine was going to ask her about the photographs when Sara noticed that she had turned her head to the inside of the door.

She approached her and closed the door. "If you're ready we could have breakfast"

Sara wasn't too fast enough for Catherine, not to notice the other photograph. The one with Sara and a female on the beach. The woman was leaning on Sara kissing her cheek.

"I'm ready" She said blankly. "Remember you're buying it!"

They left the looker room, Catherine wondering what other things Sara didn't want to share and thinking about the last photograph she had saw.

TBC


	20. Breakfast

**_Chapter 19 – Breakfast_**

The change in Sara's mood was too evident for Catherine. Since the brunette had caught her looking at the photographs, Sara had put distance between them. It was like a wall had been built in a matter of seconds, something that she had learnt from Grissom and improved it over the years.

Catherine didn't understand what had provoked such a reaction. It's not like she had been spying in Sara's looker. After all Sara had been the one who had opened the looker and left. If there's something Sara knew about Catherine it was that she couldn't stop herself from prying in the other's lives. She was, at least a CSI and a very curious person. But for Sara private was something really important.

They were eating their breakfast in silence at a restaurant that Sara had chosen. It had a great view of Vegas. They were near the window and Catherine could see from her spot how the city was awaking. She didn't have paid attention to the little details in a while – people taking their dogs for a walk, doing jogging, going to work -, except when she was alone, and even in those moments she was thinking in other things.

Sara raised her head from the plate and looked at Catherine while she was watching through the window with a strange look. A distant one. She opened her mouth to say something, but closed it again. She had caught Catherine looking at the photographs, but when the blonde was going to asked her about them, she had panicked. She didn't want to explain every one of them, because that meant more questions. So she had decided to shut her out and avoid it. Now she was wondering if it was right not to let Catherine in.

She raised her head again to look at the blonde when she found her staring at her. She almost didn't eat anything from the breakfast that the waitress had served them.

"You're not eating" Sara stated more than asked to the blonde

"I'm not that hungry" Catherine turned again her head to the window and took a sip of her coffee.

Sara signed and left the fork on her plate. She put her hands on the table and watched Catherine. She stared at her with unemotional eyes.

"What's wrong?" She asked

Catherine turned to her and Sara could see a disappointed look in her eyes.

"I'm not the one who changed her mood when we were at the looker room, so you tell me." She replied bitterly

She knew that Catherine was going to bring that subject at any moment. She had prepared a reply to her, but she didn't expect that look in her blue eyes. It was the same look that she gave her when she had closed Eddie's case. That made her heart arch in pain.

For a moment, Catherine saw the brunette flinch, but it was replaced quickly by another wall.

"I mean, one moment you're joyful and the next second you're ready to bite my head off without any reason…I don't know on what foot I should stand"

"You're upset…" Sara said stating more than asking.

"I'm not…I'm just…I don't know how to be with you…"

"What are you talking about? You don't need to act around me" Sara said molested by Catherine's word. She didn't need people pretending.

"That's not what I meant" She signed in frustration "You see that's the problem, we can't communicate without fighting"

"I'm not the one who started it, and just for your information we are not fighting every time"

"That's rich…you know if you had more constancy in your mood maybe we wouldn't be arguing right now"

"I'm not arguing. You are" She said bitterly and pointing a finger to the blonde. She took a deep breath to calm herself. Catherine knew how to push her buttons. "It's just that I don't like people sneaking in my private life"

"Excuse me?" She sounded outraged. "I didn't sneak around!! You're the one who opened your locker and left it that way!"

"That's pry into someone's life." Catherine was about to protest when Sara interrupted her "That my locker was opened doesn't give you permission to nose around"

"Whatever" She sighed exasperated "You know what? I don't want to fight with you not today, nor ever"

"Me either. I'm tired of this" Sara admitted to the blonde.

Catherine's expression softened. She looked at the brunette in front of her. She looked like there was a big weight over her shoulders. "I'm sorry I saw those pictures, but admit that if you wanted to protect your privacy that much you should have closed your locker"

Neither of the two women spoke again, so Catherine stared out of the window again sipping her coffee.

Sara thought about what Catherine had just said. She was right. She had made a mistake leaving the locker opened. She hated to admit it but…

"You're right" Sara said almost in a whisper and without looking at the blonde.

That caught Catherine's attention once more to the brunette seated in front of her. But she didn't reply to her. She just kept looking at her eyes, waiting for Sara to go on. When she didn't say anything, Catherine spoke again.

"Sorry I think I didn't hear you? What did you just say?"

Sara was uncomfortable. She didn't look at her, she just kept her stare in her plate barely touched. "You heard me clear…I said that you're right"

Catherine chuckled. She really like seeing a Sara so shy. "Wow, Sara Sidle admitting that I'm right! Call the press!" A chuckled escaped from her lips. "Sorry" Catherine admitted smiling. But Sara was smiling too.

"I can't believe you made such a drama, just because I don't like people snea….been curious about me. I'm not used to it". Sara said staring at her, really curious. "What do you want from me, Catherine?" She asked in a soft tone. "Why that interest in me?"

"I just want to know you. Is it a crime?" She asked with her eyebrows arched. Sara was going to protest when Catherine cut her off. "Do you realize that we've been working together for the past 8 years, and we barely know each other?"

Sara thought about Catherine's words. She didn't know if it was a good idea to talk about her past because she knew that would lead to more questions, questions she didn't think she was prepared to answer. Catherine had a point. She rarely said something about herself.

Catherine watched the indecision on Sara's face. She was taking her time. It wasn't a difficult decision for her but for the brunette it seemed like the end of the world. _"Does it mean that she doesn't trust me? What is so important that she is trying to hide it?"_ Those were Catherine's thoughts.

After a few minutes, she seemed to arrive to a resolution. She didn't look up at her. Instead she kept her stare in the plate in front of her.

"Yeah, maybe I should open up a bit" She looked at her "But, that doesn't mean that you did the right thing looking in my locker. If you want to know something, ask me"

"Look, I am really sorry about looking at your pictures without your 'permission'. I admit that my curiosity won and you're right. It wasn't the right thing to do, and I'm sorry" The sincerity was evident in her voice. She hoped Sara could catch on that.

"Apology accepted" Sara said with a nod of her head.

"Good" She smiled in relief. "Now can I ask you something?"

Sara smiled at her, one of her half smiles, the seductive one "You can ask, getting an answer from me is another thing".

"I see" She leaned forward on the table "You're not making this easy, you know?"

"I'm not really comfortable talking about myself. But go on. Ask your questions"

"Who was the boy on the picture?"

Sara stared at her. She knew that eventually, she had to talk about her family, but she had expected that Catherine wouldn't head directly there. She waited a moment to measure her words.

"You really go straight to the kill, don't you?"

"You're not answering the question"

Sara took a breath "That's my brother" She said finally.

Catherine kept looking at her. She waited for Sara to go on, but the brunette didn't add anything else. _"This is going to be frustrating."_ She thought to herself.

"And that's it? That's all I'll get for answer?"

"Ok, calm down." She took a sip of her coffee trying to avoid more questions about her brother, or about her family. "He's six years older than I. The photograph you saw was took it when I was seven"

"Does he have a name?"

"Sean"

"You seemed closed from each other." Catherine said remembering the photograph.

"Yeah, I think you could say that" Sara said absently, remembering the day the photograph was taken by her mother. She told Catherine about that day like it was yesterday. That was easy for her, and they even laughed a bit about the anecdotes she describe of that day. _"One of the a few happy days"_ Sara thought to herself.

"And where is he now? What does he do for living?" Catherine said taking a beat of her meal.

"Why do you want to know? Are you going to date him?" Sara replied nervously and with a smile on her lips not looking at her. She had tried to make a joke trying to avoid the question, but the effect her words elicited were the opposite of the one expected.

The moment Sara heard the sound of the fork falling in the plate, she knew she had made a mistake. She looked at Catherine with a mixture of sadness and regret. What she saw was anger and hurt in the blonde's face.

"I…Catherine…"

"What is that suppose to mean? I can't ask a question without sexual motive?" She signed angrily. "Glad to know you have such a high opinion of me"

Sara tried to explain herself, but Catherine just closed to her. She passed a hand though her hair and stared through the window, but she couldn't let it go. "No, don't worry. I got you loud and clear" She made a pause trying to compose herself, but her anger was getting the best of her "You think I'm cheap…but what did I expect, after all I let my sexuality cloud my judgment about men, right?"

The words that Sara had pronounced once to her, returned like a blow. She thought how to fix what she had done. If she wanted to fix it she needed to be honest.

"Catherine, I'm sorry. It was mean to be a joke, nothing more" The blonde was going to reply but Sara was not done yet "And you're wrong actually…I do have a high opinion of you, even if you think I don't"

Catherine looked at her with her mouth hanging open.

"I'm not done yet, so don't try to say anything" Sara replied to her. "You're an amazing CSI, even better than me. You need to take care of a daughter and that's not easy with the kind of work we have. Add to that, you are a beautiful woman and people are aware of that, or do you think the contrary?" Once again Sara cut off Catherine "You could have anyone you want at your feet in a matter of seconds, only lifting your fingers" She make the gesture to emphasize her words "That's easy"

"Wow…I'm…really touched" She said. After all the fights they've been trough, the bitterness, the indifference…she had never expected that Sara had such a concept of her.

"It's the truth, otherwise I wouldn't had said anything"

After a few seconds, Catherine smiled, still surprised. She leaned forward on the table.

"That I'm a beautiful woman it's something I already knew, but I don't think I can have everyone I want at my feet" She add joking

Sara mimicked her posture "Believe me, you have" She said looking straight to her blue eyes with total seriousness. "I can see how people look at you. They want to be with you, they admire you and at the same time they desire you. So, yes you can have everyone you want"

"It doesn't mean I want them…" She replied slightly bitter.

"I hope, otherwise the waiting line would be very long" Sara said joking enlighten the mood and making Catherine chuck softly.

After a few second neither of the two women spoke. They just stared at each other, trying to figure out what was happening. The first to move was Catherine, who half closed her eyes looking at Sara suspiciously.

"Are you trying to avoid the question?" She said in a sensual and soft tone with a shadow of a smile.

Sara smiled from one side to another. A bright smile, the ones that made Catherine feel weak and her heart beat faster.

"As I said, I'm just stating the truth. And in response to your question…" Sara's face turned serious again. After a few seconds she added "What question?" She said, making the both of them laugh.

"No, seriously" Catherine said between laughs. "Where is he?"

Sara stopped laughing and looked through the window. She tried to find the words without telling Catherine too much.

"I don't know. We lost contact years ago" She said absently.

"I'm sorry to hear that" Catherine said putting her hand over the brunette's. Sara stared at their hands, but she didn't break the contact. She just squeezed.

Catherine was going to say something, but Sara cut her off. "I don't really want to talk about it, if you don't mind. At least not yet."

"Ok" Catherine said. "What about the other photographs?"

"Uh, uh, no more questions Catherine" Sara said shaking her head. "If I'm going to tell you about me, it's fair enough you tell me about you"

"Oh come on! You know I'm an opened book" She said with a smile.

"_Quid pro quo, Clarice_" Sara said imitating the voice and the face of Dr. Lecter, perfectly.

"What was that?" Catherine said curiously.

Sara looked at her in surprise. "Oh come on! Don't tell me you haven't seen 'The Silence of the Lambs'?"

"Then I won't tell you" Catherine said laughing

"This is incredible. I mean, It's one of the best films in history." She said still amazed by Catherine's confession.

Catherine was looking at her with a mixture of pleasure and joy. It had been a long time since she had been Sara so passionate about something that had nothing to do with work.

"I didn't know you were a junky of cinema"

"Well I'll try to go, sometimes." Sara responded. Silence set again between the two women. Sara was thinking something, She had that look of concentration when she was trying to figured out something, and was watching Catherine with nervous eyes.

"What?" The blonde asked still smiling. It was like a permanent smile had set in her lips. She couldn't stop it.

"I was thinking…ermm… that this is good" She said gesturing a hand between both of them. The confusion in Catherine's face was evident. "I mean, you and I having breakfast outside of work, been friendly".

"Yeah, I was thinking the same. Maybe we should do this more often" Catherine replied hoping that Sara was agree

"That would be really good" Sara said with a bright smile.

They talked about Catherine's past and how she became a CSI. How she had met Jimmy Toledo when she was a stripper, how Grissom was the only one who offered her a decent job and helped her to make it. How she grabbed that opportunity and fight tooth and nail to never let it go.

Meanwhile, Catherine was talking about herself, as Sara has request, she started to realize the person who Catherine was. Outside of work she was eager, spontaneous, full of life. She seemed a person full of confidence in herself, not the cold and bitchy person she met at first 8 years ago. At some point during these years, Sara had admired Catherine's aptitude. How she stood her opinion and had fight for what she thought. She admired her for her skills with people and how compassionate she was with the victims.

"So now that you know about me…can I ask you about the other picture?" Catherine said to her.

"What other picture?"

"The one with the woman?

Sara watched her for a moment. It was easier when Catherine was talking about herself, now that it was Catherine's turn to ask her, she decided that for today she had had enough of talking about herself. It required a tremendous effort to open up to people.

"Umm…no?" She replied her with the shadow of a smile.

"Ok…well you can't blame me for trying" Catherine said smiling nervously. There was hurt in her eyes, but she understood that maybe Sara wasn't prepared to explain all her life to her. She understood how Sara Sidle functioned. She needed to be patient and let her be the one to opened up, she needed to wait until Sara made the next step.

"Maybe we should go…I'll have to take care of Lindsey soon" She said without looking at the brunette and taking her belongings.

Sara noticed the change in Catherine's eyes. She asked herself if she had done the right thing about not talking about that photograph.

When they were leaving the restaurant Sara addressed to Catherine nervously.

"Catherine" The blonde turned to her with an expectant look "Maybe you could ask next time…when we have din…breakfast"

"Or when we have dinner..I'm thinking today before work…you could come to my place…I'll cook" Catherine replied quickly without breathing.

Sara looked at her surprised. She didn't expect that. "Dinner?" She repeated mostly to herself. After a few seconds she smile brightly to her "Yeah, that would be nice"

Catherine let out a breath she didn't even know she had been holding and returned the smile. "Great…great"

They didn't speak until they reached their cars. When Catherine was about to enter in hers, Sara called her.

"Catherine…at what time?

"Is 7 ok?"

"7 is perfect" She said still smiling. "Do you want me to bring something?"

Catherine looked at her seductively. One of that smiles that made Sara's knees turned jelly. "Just yourself"

With that expression and those words, Catherine entered her car and drive away, leaving a stunned Sara who kept watching how Catherine's car was turning small in the distance. She was grinning now. When she entered her car, she thought about the questions about his brother and Jules. Catherine had dropped it easily. Maybe, one day she could tell her what happened, but right now she couldn't allow her to know too much.

TBC


	21. Dinner

**AN: I'm sorry for updating so late...It's been more than two months...What can I say? I'm a slacker and I'm not inspired. Thank you all for your reviews :-) Well here it is a long chapter **

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**_Chapter 20 - Dinner  
_**

Sara had checked the car twice founding nothing weird. Everything was fine except for the frontal part that was really a mess. The only hypothesis was that Sabina Kitsch collided intentionally and killed herself. Sara needed to check with Catherine about the autopsy results.

_'Catherine…'_ She thought to herself. A smile appeared on her lips.

It had been one of the strangest dinners Sara had. She had arrived a few minutes before 7 and she had been staring at the door during all that time until the agreed hour. She had been trying to decide if she had to come early or just to wait until 7 o'clock to knock at the door.

Before that, she had been thinking about turning off Catherine's offer. She even had picked up the phone to cancel the event, but something in the back of her mind told her not to do it. When all's said and done, it was just a dinner. She chuckle softly remembering it.

Now that she was at the break room lost in the memories of the dinner, she had to say to herself that it hadn't been all that she expected, but more. She had been so nervous when she was waiting for someone to open the door that she had to reassure herself a few times _"It's not a date. We just agreed to eat at the same table"_. But the truth was that it had been completely the opposite.

When Catherine had opened the door, the only word that escaped from her mouth was "Hey" She was greeted in the same tone, cheerful and nervous.

"You're punctual."Catherine had said

"I try."She answered. They had been staring to each other for a few moments. Sara waiting for an invitation to enter and Catherine amazed that she had come. Something she thought wouldn't be possible, because she had had the feeling that Sara was going to turn her down.

"Are you planning for us to have dinner at the door?" Sara had said breaking the uncomfortable silence between them, Catherine had seemed to snap from whenever she was and invited her, not after apologizing for her rude manners. It was funny to see a Catherine Willows nervous, without her confidence. So Sara decided to tease her a little.

She had approached her while Catherine was closing the door. When the blonde turned over she found her a few inches away from Sara. The proximity was clearly a new bound on Catherine's nervousness. And Sara had to admit that she was nervous as well, but seeing the blonde in such a state gave her more control over her own feelings.

After a few seconds of looking at each other, Sara had raised a bag that held in her hands _"_Where do you want me to put this" She said.

Catherine broke her stare and directed her eyes to the bag, furrowing her eyebrows. "What did you bring?" She had asked quizzically, trying to catch the bag. But Sara held her out of Catherine's reach.

"Just a dessert" Sara had added with a smile.

"What dessert?"

"You'll see" She had said enigmatically.

"If my memory doesn't fail me, I remember telling you to bring only yourself" The blonde had said in a funny reprimanding tone. That had made Sara chuckle softly.

"And I did" She made a pause "But I brought some company" She had added raising again the bag. "Now that we have cleared this point, where do you want me to put it?"

"Well, taking in account that it's a dessert, I think that the best location will be the kitchen" She had said leading the way, followed closely by Sara.

"What's that smell?" Sara had asked with a puzzled expression.

"Oh just turkey! You'll love it. It's an old recipe from my grandmother." Sara had stop dead in her tracks. It couldn't be possible that Catherine didn't know that she was a vegetarian. Everybody in the lab knew that! _"Maybe this whole dinner was not a good idea" _She had thought to herself while Catherine continued explaining the secret recipe of her family and all the ingredients she had added.

Catherine had turned to her and seen a very uncomfortable Sara at the kitchen doors staring at her in disbelief.

"What?" She asked

"You cannot be serious." Sara had said still surprised that Catherine of all the persons didn't know that little detail. Of course they hadn't shared a lot of meals, but just enough to be aware that she didn't eat meat. "Geez Cath, even Grissom knows that I'm a vegetarian." She had said raising her hands.

"Noooo" Catherine said in a mocking tone.

"Yeah! What make you think I eat meat? How many times we ate the two of us?" She had known that she had made a mistake coming there.

After a few minutes, Catherine had busted into laughs. Sara had stared at her like she had grown up two heads. "What's so funny?"

"You have to see your face." Catherine said to her still laughing.

"Sorry, but I don't see the joke in here" The brunette replied still serious.

"Relax, Sidle. I was just teasing you. There's no turkey in the oven, so don't worry".

Sara hadn't seemed too convinced. "It's vegetarian lasagne, so don't worry." She had approached the brunette and given her a glass of red wine. Sara had taken a tentative sip from the glass.

"Don't worry I'm not planning to drug you" Catherine had said in a cheerful tone taking a sip from her own glass.

Sara's lips had curved in a tentative smile. "So… lasagne, eh?"

"Yep, but you'll need to wait a bit. So if you want we can get comfortable in the living room"

They had entered the living-room, a room that had plenty of photography of the Willows' family. Sara had scanned the room while sitting on the couch. Definitely it was the kind of room of a family, not the Spartan one that had been her house when she lived with her parents.

She stared at one of the photography's of Lindsey with her father. With time, the relationship between the young Willows and Sara had been improved. It had to be the death of her father what brought them close. Not too close, but enough to trust in each other. Catherine was aware of that relationship, and although at first she hadn't approved it, the time showed her that Sara was someone good to her daughter.

"So how is Lindsey?" Sara had asked her

"She's doing ok. She's at my sister's." After a pause, Catherine had said "She talks about you sometimes"

"Really?" Sara had asked surprised

"Yeah, you caused a good impression during….during …Eddie's case" The blonde had added looking at the photograph of Lindsey and her father.

Sara had been uncomfortable. Eddie's case was a thorn in her side. She hadn't been able to solve it. Yes she had closed it sending the drug dealer and the singer to jail, but sooner or later they would be out…and then what? She didn't think that was enough for a little girl who's father was murdered, neither for Catherine, although they were divorced, Eddie had been in a great part of her life.

Catherine had sensed the distance that Sara was putting between them. She had seen that Sara was lost in her own thoughts and she knew that part of the guilt the brunette was feeling was because of her. The words she had told her the day she was closing the case, kept replaying in her head. She had regretted those words, and she was determined to do whatever it took it to erase them or at least fix the damage they'd done.

She took another sip of wine. "You did your best" Sara looked at her with unemotional eyes. She had built a wall in a matter of seconds. Catherine didn't know how to jump that wall. She tried again to reassure her "You did your best, Sara".

"What a great bed time story for your little girl" Sara had said reminding Catherine's words. There was guilty in her words.

Catherine was going to say something when Sara cut her off. "You know that they are going to be out of jail in a few years? What will happen then?" She had said absently.

"We'll deal with it" The blonde had said in a serious tone. "You didn't have another option. You saw a chance to get them out of the streets and now they are in jail. Maybe not for the sentence they deserve, but at least they are in jail"

Sara didn't seem convinced. She had failed to Catherine and to Lindsey and that's something she would never forget to herself. She had tried to compensate it being there for Lindsey whenever she needed her, but with Catherine it had been different. They hadn't been in the best terms, arguing constantly, but after Sara's suspension, things had changed.

A strange smell brought her from her thoughts. Catherine had noticed too. Realization fell on her face.

"Oh shit! The lasagne!" She had said getting up from her spot and running to the kitchen. Sara had left the glass of wine on the table and followed her. Her walk was steady; she was suspecting what she would see when she would open the door to the kitchen.

A fog of smoke was covering almost all the kitchen. Catherine was trying to put the tray over the counter.

"I can't believe it" She had said upset trying to disperse the smoke coming from the trail

Sara had approached to her smiling. Catherine noted her expression and pointed a finger to her. "Don't you dare say anything"

"You know, Cath…" The brunette said opening the windows of the kitchen to make disperse the smoke. "I'm amazed by your skills in the kitchen" She said in a mocking tone.

Once all the windows were opened she went next to Catherine and observed what was supposed to be a lasagne. "Yep definitely is not turkey"

"Neither lasagne" Catherine added with her hands in her hips. "Do you think we can save anything about it?"

Sara raised her eyebrows and with a sigh she added " I'm sorry Miss Willows, but I think that it didn't survive"

Catherine's head went to her chest in a surrender gesture. Sara put a hand in her back and said to her "Oh come on! It's not so terrible…it's only a bit … burned"

"A bit burned? Sara, do you see anything that it's not black in this meal? It's completely burned!!" The blonde had said a bit loud gesturing to the tray.

"Ok, it's burned, maybe if we scratch the surface we can eat something" Sara took a knife and tried to do what she had said. The surface was as tough as a rock. "Ok, that wasn't a good option"

She looked at Catherine and saw the blonde's face full of disappointed. Catherine had wanted to make it special, and in fact she did it, and obviously she had, but not in the way she had expected. She took a deep breath.

"Ok, this goes to the garbage" She had said picking the tray and throwing the contents there. "Let me find what we can do" She had added looking in the fridge.

"Er… Cath"

"What?" She said without looking at the brunette and searching for something to cook.

"Do you really think it's a good idea that you cook again seeing the results?" Sara had asked tentatively.

Catherine had turned to her "What is that supposed to mean?" This time the blonde asked a bit offended.

"Well, no offence but I think it's obvious" Sara had said looking at the garbage were their meal was.

"So I suck at cooking, that's what are you trying to say?" Catherine said adopting a defensive posture. Her tone didn't leave any doubt that she was now really offended.

"It's not like the lasagne was intact" Sara had said chuckling.

Catherine looked at her like she was ready to jump at her. "You think you can do better than I do?" She had said in a defiant tone.

"Well admit that it's not difficult" Sara had said joking. She looked at Catherine's eyes and saw the challenge in them. She had stared at her for a brief moment. The corners of her lip turned up "You know what?" She finally had said never leaving Catherine's eyes.

"What Miss Sidle?"

"I'll do it"

"You do what?" Catherine had said starting to lose her patience.

"I'm going to cook for you" There had been determination in Sara's voice

A laugh had escaped from Catherine. "Are you sure?"

"Yeah" Sara had said taking off the jacket she was wearing and rolling up her shirt's sleeves. "So…get out of there and let me cook"

Catherine had been surprised by this outburst. It had been supposed to be the contrary. She had been the one to invite Sara for dinner and now that dinner was ruined and Sara was going to cook for her … the same Sara Sidle who was always ordering meals.

Sara had started to put things out of the fridge. Mostly had been vegetables. She had started to cut and peeling. Catherine had watched amazed how quickly the brunette was moving around the kitchen.

"Why don't you stop staring at me and start to do something?" Sara had said with a half smile without looking at her.

"What do you want me to do?"

They manage to prepare a decent meal, a mix of vegetables, eggs, and other things. But it was good. Really good. Catherine had to admit that this was better that a burned lasagne. While they had been eating Catherine had wondered where Sara had learnt to cook.

"So now, you're not only a Dr. but you're a chef too". The blonde had said taking a bit of their meal "And a very good one I must admit!"

"I only cook when there's a tray full of burned lasagne" The brunette had said laughing.

"In that case we should burn lasagne more often" Catherine had replied with a wink.

"And when it's worth to cook for someone" Sara had added almost in a whisper.

Catherine had looked at her surprised. She hadn't known how to take Sara's comment. The brunette had saw the confusion in her face and stared at her.

"That was meant to be a compliment, Cath. It's only when you have good company that it's worth cooking for someone else. At least for me"

Catherine had smiled, blushing a bit. She had cleared her throat. "So where did you learnt to cook so well?"

It had been then that Sara explained to her part of her past. The B&B that her parents manage and how she had to cook for their lodgers. She had explained to her how her mother taught her and how she had managed to do a few recipes on her own.

Obviously it wasn't that Sara was really proud of it. But as she had said, she didn't like cooking and she always tried to avoid the kitchen as much as she could, but in certain moments she felt the necessity of cooking. Mostly for survival, as she had called it, and other for a special person.

Catherine had felt flattered. In those moments while they had been eating and Sara had been talking the way she had been talking to her, Catherine had felt special. It only had taken to Sara a few words to make her feel that way. She was opening to her. Slowly, but she was doing it. And every time she did it, Catherine was surprised again. There were so many things she didn't know about the brunette, and every time she wanted to know more and more.

They ended eating the dessert Sara had brought. Tiramisu.

"God…this is really good" Catherine had said not after a moan of pleasure. Sara had watched her ate the cake, a smile on her lips. Not only it had been a pleasure eating the cake, watching Catherine's face while she was eating it was pleasant too. A lot of thoughts crossed her mind. She had tried to hide her blush at the images that formed in her mind.

"Don't tell me you made that too" Catherine had asked surprised, misunderstanding Sara's blush.

"Oh no, my skills are not that good with desserts" She had said taking a sip of wine. She had got caught staring her.

They had continued talking about everything and nothing. Time had passed and the hour of departure, arrived without notice. Although they were going to see each other in a few hours, the farewell had been uncomfortable. None of them had known how to react or what to say. They had been on the porch. Sara with her hands in the back pockets of her jeans and Catherine learning on the doorframe.

"I'm sorry about the dinner" Catherine had said a bit nervous.

"Please, don't be sorry. I didn't expect to cook, but it's been a pleasure." Sara had said shyly.

"Now that I know that your skills as a chef are so good, I think I'm going to have more meals with you" She had said laughing nervously.

"Whenever you want" Sara had added quickly. "Maybe tomorrow I can give you the opportunity to redeem your lasagne"

Catherine had been caught by surprise. She had looked at her smiling brightly. "Ok, I take it as a challenge" She had added.

"Good" Sara had said.

Before Sara could do a move, Catherine had approached her and had planted a kiss on the brunette's cheek, lingering a bit, catching her by surprise. She then had whispered in Sara's ear

"Thank you"

"What for?" Sara had asked confused, still not making a move.

"For cooking and making this dinner special" Catherine had said looking at Sara's eyes.

Sara had looked at her. There had been something in Catherine's eyes that had kept her still. She hadn't wanted to leave, she had wanted to lose herself in those blue eyes.

"You're more than welcome" She finally had said.

They had been staring at each other, none of them making a move for several seconds. Catherine had opened her mouth to say something but had closed again.

"I'll see you at work" Sara had said starting to leave when suddenly she had turned to Catherine.

"Hey Cath!" She had called. When the blonde had looked at her she had add "Just tried not to burn something else, ok?"

"Oh, shut up!" But she had been smiling.

"Well seems like someone is in a good mood" Greg said interrupting Sara's thoughts.

She took a sip of her coffee trying to hide the smile that was on her lips. A smile that since she had left Catherine's house never faded away.

Greg seated next to her staring at her. He was starting to be annoying.

"Stop staring at me, Greg" Sara said without looking at him

"Are you going to tell me what put you in such a great mood that you can't erase that stupid smile from your face?" He said arching his brows and looking at her with funny eyes.

"That's not your business"

"Ahh I see…." He said turning serious. He put her best face of investigator. Suddenly he smiled from one side to the other. "You had a date!" He exclaimed pointing a finger to Sara.

"Greg, do you know that pointing a finger to someone is rude?" She said to him seriously.

"You are not going to tell me anything, aren't you?"

A smile appeared in Sara's face "Nope" She said leaving in search of the blonde.

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**I'm sorry if this chapter disappoints you. I can't do better, but I'll try with the rest of the story. I'll try to update more often but now it's going to be quite difficult...anyway. Thanks for reading**


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